Wednesday, October 30, 2013

Scratching the Surface


Today's blog is brought to you by actual thoughts from the shower. I went in tonight conscious that I have about ten days to look ten years younger and thirty pounds thinner. If you read yesterday's blog, you know that I have been offered a lucrative modeling contract... well at least I get to prance around on stage for one day to benefit The American Cancer Society and I suppose Maurices. Okay, maybe I don't really care about the thinner part, this is after all a zero to plus size clothing store, so that part doesn't bother me. I do however want to go to this thing looking as though I do know a bath sponge from a kitchen sponge and have a close relationship with youth and style. Basically, I want to lie.

As I was putting my skin and hair through the paces tonight, I realized all the unnatural things we women do to ourselves in order to look as though we have natural beauty. It's really a little frightening. For instance, the first thing I do to myself is get this body scrubber mitt I have that is a first cousin to sandpaper. This mitt is a bright pastel blue and my husband's sandpaper is usually black or brown, so I can tell them apart. I dump Oil of Olay soap on it and scrub my face beyond all reason to remove dead skin cells. Now, I am admittedly not one of those women with the hour long face cleansing process. I use soap. That's it. Oil of Olay soap scrubbed into my face and I'm pretty much done. I don't use all those other things because they break my skin out and make me look like a scaly lizard woman instead of Claudia Schiffer. I cannot afford chemical peels and trips to the day spa, so my scubby mitt thing has a daily job of turning my face into a well sanded piece of flesh, and that's that. Then I glob more of the same soap on the sandpaper mitt and do the same process to my entire body. I am a little OCD about germs and the idea of dead skin being in my bed is enough to give me nightmares for a year, so I make sure there is as little skin left on my body as possible. By the time I get through scrubbing, there is nothing left but a single bright red layer of skin covering my whole body and all of the cells left on it are desperately trying to regenerate so they have some company for the night. Once I am through stripping my body down to nothing but a coating of skin over muscle tissue, I grab a pumice stone and start on my feet. I abhor the thought of ashy feet. I've seen those poor diabetic people who get that thick, rhinoceros-like skin on their heels and toes and it gives me the shivers. I am not a person who believes we need callouses. I believe we need cute trendy shoes and baby soft, pink feet. So I begin the daily foot sanding. I never ever skip this part. I have a four sided foot stick thing with a pumice stone, an oval of actual black sandpaper, an oval of metal nutmeg grater and an oval of some sort of brush that I use on my thighs to get them smooth. And heaven help you if you, for just random instance, not that I have ever done this EVER, but if you slip into a daydream about Shemar Moore watching you shower and reaching heights of ecstasy previously unknown to him before and he suddenly finds himself head over heels in love with you and... you realize you have sanded a hole into the bottom of your big toe and you are now freely bleeding into the tub. So after I have for the most part bereft my body of any skin at all, I shave. Now I will never add this to the list of unnatural things we do. I have a superstition that if I don't shave my legs, the day that I don't shave them, I will dislocate my knee (which hurts worse than child birth) and a male doctor will have to re-set my knee and it will be hairy I will be mortified. I have actually had my kneecap around in the bend of my leg before about four or five times and while the human body was not made to deal with that much pain, I am also aware every time I do it that I have hairy legs. Therefore, I have found a way to keep my kneecaps where they belong; shaved legs equal safe legs. Also, I know this doesn't bother some women, but the idea of even a single hair in my armpit is just a little too natural to me. Those bad boys are shaved every day whether they are hairy or not. Moving on. I know that the day before I go do this thing, I will spend a good hour ripping hair out of my face by the roots. There is a quote by a lady, and forgive me, I do not remember who said it, but it was so great “I refuse to call them chin hairs. They are simply stray eyebrows”. Once I hit thirty, I became the bearded goat lady from hell. There is a little patch under my chin that grows very thick, very manly beard hairs. I never notice these suckers are there until one day I am maybe scratching my collar bone and I feel a hair blow across my hand and I begin feeling around and realize there is a hair hanging from my face that is a foot long. It's one of those hairs you kind of wrap around your hand a few times and then give a big YANK on and pull it out of your face by the roots. I swear, I don't know where these hairs come from. The men in the middle east look at my face and cry for the unfairness of it all. So, yes, I will sit with a mirror that magnifies my face to four times it's actual size a pair of tweezers and I will spend a significant amount of time pulling hair from my chin, upper lip and eyebrow region. I have a cream actually that I am supposed to use on my upper lip to help rid myself of my man-stache, but after it has dissolved the hair roots and I have wiped them out of my flesh with a warm, damp washcloth, my upper lip area swells up and turns red for about twelve hours and people tend to stare. Back to the shower: after all of the washing, sanding, scrubbing, and exfoliating, at the very end of my shower, I take my same blue mitt and lather it up with my Bath and Body Works body crème of the day and scrub the good smelly lotion back into the one remaining layer of skin I have left from the neck down. This approach to applying lotion makes me smell good all day long as I have scrubbed the scent into my flesh and keeps me from feeling greasy because any extra is allowed to rinse off in the shower. Then once I'm out of the shower I put on that Oil of Olay Reginerist stuff because while I do not care if I get grey hair, I have an innate fear of wrinkles. I don't know how I think I am going to get through my senior years, but I do not want wrinkles. I don't wear face makeup ever because I just hate the way it feels, so I have nothing to cover up blemishes and wrinkles, so every night I put on this face crème, which I swear must be made with heroine, it's really addictive, in hopes that I will always have the face of a twenty five year old.

All of this torture and scrubbing and ripping and gashing and slathering for at least an hour a day, just so I can make you think I am naturally beautiful? Something is profoundly wrong with me. I don't have time to worry about it now though, I have to go do my hair...

Thank you BlogHer, you have given me confidence

http://www.blogher.com/nablopomo-october-2013-blogroll?wrap=nablopomo-blogrolls&snid=570491

So, I know I am jumping the gun a day early, but here is a shout-out to BlogHer's October 2013 NaBloPoMo.  I did not trust myself to add the pretty picture and link to my blog because if it was a dismal failure I didn't want it to reflect badly on them.  Also, I just figured out how to upload a picture to my entry.  I just want to say thank you to the people who kept me writing and the people who read and seemed genuinely entertained by the stuff that fell out of my brain.  That's kind of the coolest thing ever for someone who really wants to call herself a writer, but doesn't have the guts to do it yet.  I have signed on to participate in November's NaBloPoMo knowing that I am also planning on fulfilling my personal goal of 50,000 words by the end of November.  Wish me luck.  And thank you so very much to the people who took time to read my blog.  It's kind of cool to look at the page view count when I post.  A bit of a thrill really.  You all have encouraged me for better or worse.  I owe it all to you.  Thank you!

Tuesday, October 29, 2013

A model citizen


Ladies and gentlemen, I have been discovered! *Jazz Hands!!! I went to Maurices today to exchange some clothes that I had ordered online in the wrong size. I have recently lost weight and as a result took a wild guess at my new size when I ordered clothes. I was wrong from top to bottom pretty much everywhere. Anyway, I took the clothes back to the actual store so I could try on the clothes before buying them, which oddly enough, worked out for me. For anyone who doesn't know, Maurices is a womens clothing store with sizes, I believe, 0-26. It's fabulous. So, I'm in there shopping and I start talking to this lady who I later find out is spearheading their charity for The American Cancer Society. They are doing a fashion show in town, and she asked me to be in it! Look at me! I am a runway model! Okay, they have a little handwritten sign by the cash register that says “If you are interested in helping The American Cancer Society ask today about volunteer opportunities” BUT they did not hide the sign from me as I walked in the door AND she asked me. It really wouldn't have occurred to me to ask her about it at all. So, I'm taking the fact that they didn't deny having anything to do with fashion if it concerned me as a total ego boost! I modeled some stretchy clothing once when I was younger. I can't remember what the product was called, but everything was made out out of T-shirt material; shirts with different collar lines, skirts, pants, shorts, culottes, etc... and they were all solid colors made out of the bright colors that forever marked the 80's. I believe the general idea was you could wear a long purple shirt with a short orange skirt over blue leggings with yellow wristbands and look totally rad. You were supposed to get a bunch of each type of clothing in all different colors and have multiple ways of assaulting the public in a mix and match manner. That and an interview and a screen test which involved speaking (which I bombed because I dread it like I dread spiders and the plague) with some agency was the sum total of my modeling career. However, I feel that I have reinvented myself and I am going to come back stronger than ever and start a revolution, bringing large butts and tiny busts into fashion because I am just that cool. I am a little worried though. When I went in tonight, I went in on the tail end of this stomach flu I've been dealing with. I haven't washed my hair in three days, I was wearing no makeup and I have on the right side of my chin my monthly “I'm on my period” pimple that comes up and gets all red and swollen and hard and then dies back down. It's like I come equipped with my own personal stop light. You know when you see the bright red light on my face (and it is always in the same spot), to stop and look both ways before crossing me. I also think I was faintly sweaty as I had put on a sweater on the one day that it stopped being the temperature of Greenland outside. I'm just wondering if they asked me to volunteer, who did they have signing up? I will never put down another woman for personal appearance (unless I think you need to have put more clothes on before leaving the house, like the bottom half of your shorts or the top half of your shirt), because lord knows us girls have it bad enough with media, society and men criticizing us and trying to make us unhealthy. No, I'm not saying I think the other women must look really bad, I'm simply wondering if they actually had any volunteers that were human because let's just say I was not putting my species in the best light this afternoon. I have a bad feeling there is going to be me, a hydra, an articulate baboon with a swollen red butt and a super thin but attractive extra terrestrial. Also, I walk with a cane. I have yet to find a medical cane that I can make look sexy, but I'll give it a shot. I figure I'll go out there and have fun and have the fun of knowing that I'm a overweight 34 year old mother of three kids who was asked to be a model for one day. So on the tenth of November, please ask me what my plans are. You can even ask it in a way that implies you have something you want me to do with you socially. Because I'm dying to tell someone that I simply can't work it in and why. “Theresa, can you come hang out with me in LA this afternoon, Justin Timberlake is just dying to meet you.” And I will say with a careless wave, “Darling, I simply can't, I'm due on the runway this evening. Give him my love, ciao!”

Also, today Google+ informed me I have earned my own URL and they have reserved one for me. They gave me the address and everything. I have the feeling this is good, but I don't know what a URL is or what I would do with one if I got hold of it. I'll poke it and see what it does.

Monday, October 28, 2013

Waking the Dead


It is 2:56 in the morning as I write this blog. No, I am not a productive early riser, I am a person who cannot go to sleep because my husband has broken his C-Pap machine. Just to put this in perspective for those of you who think I'm being fussy about a few snores now and then... Dan used to be married to a lady he met in Korea. She was completely deaf. He used to wake her up. Dan can wake a deaf woman up out of a sound sleep with his snoring. I swear to you I am not making this up. This man was a captain in the army and they wouldn't let him sleep where he could give away their position. I am currently wearing a pair of Sony headphones and have Train cranked up on my computer sound level at 71%. I am going to permanently damage my hearing and I can very clearly hear his snores over the music. The sudden monster snorts are especially startling. I am bopping my head singing “When you move me everything is groovy, They don't like it sue me, Either way SNNAAARRKKK Holy crap! What was that?!” Do you remember the Looney Tunes cartoon where that little puppy would sneak up behind that cat and go BARK BARK BARK BARK BARK? And that cat would flip out and grab ahold of the ceiling with nothing but it's claws? That would be me. He hits one of those especially adrenaline producing snorts and I find myself suddenly clinging to the ceiling with my fingernails and my hair standing straight on end. I gently let myself down into the bed and realize I am shaking like I'm on a three day caffeine high. Gently I look over at his helpless sleeping form and realize how very easy it would be to kill him so I could get some sleep.

I have tried everything I know to pass the time. I have been working on a book that I've been meaning to finish for a while now, and I have managed to get several thousand words added to it tonight. I took a break from that and ate some frosted mini-wheats forgetting momentarily that I have become lactose intolerant. I remember it now as my stomach is bloated to the point that it looks like I am in my third trimester of a pregnancy. Then I decided to amuse myself by snoring with him, so every time he made a huge snore I would try to copy it with him. Now I have a sore throat and for the life of me I cannot figure out how he does that without making his throat feel like raw hamburger meat. After a while that lost it's charms so I found a new amusement. As he would let out his snore I would quickly squeeze and unsqueeze his nose so it sounded like SN—SN—SN--SN--SN--SN--ORE--ORE. Kind of like a tiny snoring machine gun! That was actually fairly entertaining for a while. You can do it to tunes like “Row Row Row Your Boat” or “Twinkle Little Star” or “Old MacDonald's Farm”. The giggling makes it a little dangerous but he never really woke up enough to figure out what I was doing or for that matter to figure out what he was doing. I have now put on the headphones and started writing this blog. I have a feeling it is going to be a long night. He gets up at seven a.m. and it is now three twenty six. I have three and a half more hours to kill before I can go to sleep. I actually recorded him at one point tonight just because I had reached that point that I had to either laugh or go stark raving mad. I have three minutes of what sounds like a moose being fed through a wood chipper. My eyes have now reached that stage where they are permanently open. I no longer blink, I just stare wide eyed at the illuminated computer screen looming out of the darkness. I think I am drinking out of a water bottle beside my bed, but it seems like I've been drinking out of that bottle for a while now. It could be a bottle of perfume and I probably wouldn't have any idea at this point. One thing I've noticed about my mind on no sleep is that the music that I am blasting through my brain is being listened to. I put my iTunes on the Train album California 37, and my sleep deprived brain is really listening to this music. I mean deeply paying attention to the words that are being said and I just keep thinking “What the hell am I listening to?” I really like Train. I think there's like me and one other person on the planet that does, but I went to their concert once and listened to Patrick sing Marry Me unplugged and it was one of the most amazing experiences of my life. I know that sounds ridiculous, but listening to him sing that song to a silent arena full of people, just using his voice, no mics, nothing, was beautiful. It was overwhelming to the point of bringing me to tears. When I got home I immediately downloaded their last two albums and have listened to them on and off for a while, but I never really listened to them. I babbled whatever words I thought sounded right as I sang along, but some of these lyrics are just weird. No one can ever say the man doesn't have the voice of an angel, but he could give Neil Diamond a run for his money as far as bizarre lyrics go. So, this has been my night. Amusing myself with the terrible snores of the sleep depriving snark monster lying next to me, bloating myself beyond all reason with a bowl full of milk, damaging my hearing for life and trying to make sense of senseless lyrics. And look at that! Only three hours and fifteen minutes left to burn.

Friday, October 25, 2013

Uuugh

Dear readers,
I believe I have a stomach flu, either that or I am about to hatch an alien. Either way, I am in no shape to write tonight and will return when I am not actively wishing for death by combustion.
Love,
Me

Wednesday, October 23, 2013

Stupid in the City Part 2.


As promised yesterday, this is a continuation of my hapless adventures in Atlanta. For those of you who didn't read yesterday's blog – and shame on you – I lived in Atlanta, Georgia with my dad for the summer during the 1996 summer Olympics. I lived downtown, right on Peachtree Street and wandered the city, unsupervised, to my fifteen year old heart's content. As I wrote yesterday, I had a gun pulled on me and assuming it was a joke, laughed at the guy and walked off. Turns out he really was robbing people during the night and he made the morning news. I however didn't get mugged or shot because I was too stupid to know he was serious. Ignorance is truly bliss. I met this unsavory man at a little greasy spoon I was a waitress at called the Copper Kettle. It is exactly like a Waffle House, down to the yellow square tiles with black letters on the sign. Also you can order pancakes at the Copper Kettle whereas you are limited to waffles at Waffle House.

One day, as fate would have it, I had to go to the restroom while on duty. To go to the restrooms from the dining room, one goes through a swinging brown door with a smoke stained, greasy plexiglass circle window in it and behind that is a hallway. The layout of the hallway was as follows: on the right hand side was a door immediately opening into the store office, then a bit further down the hall was the woman's restroom and then the man's restroom just past that.

Background: This Copper Kettle was owned by an enormous Holiday Inn that was next door and every day someone from the Holiday Inn came down to our restaurant, chatted with the manager, Margaret, and they would empty the safe and the Holiday Inn employee would presumably return to the hotel where the hotel management would make one large bank deposit at the end of the day. I had seen this transaction time and again and knew what was more or less happening because Margaret had taken the time to explain this procedure to me. It happened every day and I never thought much about it.

Back to having to use the bathroom: So, I opened the swinging door and stepped into the hallway and movement in the office caught my attention. There were two men kneeling on the floor in front of the open safe removing money from it. I said hello and told them to have a good day, one guy waved a little at me, then I went to the bathroom, handled my business, washed my hands and came back out. I continued doing my job, earning money for my first car. About ten minutes after I had used the restroom, Margaret came flying through the swinging door, her dark curly hair flowing out behind her, yelling “We got robbed! Oh shit! We got robbed! The safe is EMPTY! OH MY GOD, WE'VE BEEN ROBBED!”. I immediately knew the two guys I had said a cheerful hello to had been bad guys robbing us blind and not the nice hotel employees I had taken them to be. I was completely panic stricken for a few minutes. I couldn't say anything. I was fifteen and had no idea what the police would do to some airhead who said hello to thieves and then told them to have a good day. Hell, if they had asked I would have probably made them a waffle and gotten them a bag! I waited until everything cooled down out front and then pulled Margaret in the office and told her what I'd seen. It turns out I was right to be terrified because she asked me if I was F***ing stupid and I pretty much had to say that yes, in fact I was. That was one red faced, fire breathing, angry little woman! How could I have thought they were with the hotel? I had no idea. Why didn't I come get someone?! I thought they were with the hotel. How could I have possibly thought they were with the hotel?? I had no idea.

Well of course the police came and I had to give them a statement and try to recall anything I could about the two guys that I welcomed so warmly as they were robbing us clean. That was a horrible part too, because they didn't look like bad guys. They were just guys. There was nothing remarkable about them, they weren't even tattooed and pierced, they were just guys in polo shirts. I think one had brown hair. “Yes officer, they were in polo shirts. One had brown hair.” “Well thank you ma'am, that's a huge lead! That narrows it down to under four billion people! Good job!”. Somehow I didn't get fired, but probably only because there are laws against firing people with obvious mental deficiencies.

Also, just to wrap things up... One night my dad and I came back from romping all over Olympic Park and decided to pop into the Copper Kettle for a evening breakfast. When I came walking in the door, shouts and exclamations were hurled in my direction, the cook and a waitress both gave me a hug and one of the waitresses was crying as she hung around my neck. Another cook yelled at me “Where the HELL have you been?” and that was followed by similar questions from all of the restaurant staff. I was told I could have at least had the decency to call at least half a dozen times and the gay assistant cook said now that I was safe she was going to kick my ass. I just stood there a minute blinking at all of them. I looked up at dad and he looked down at me and we just looked back at them. I said “I was off tonight, I worked this morning”. Then someone smacked the counter with her hand and said “THE BOMB?”. Again I stood looking at her without the slightest comprehension of what she was talking about or why I would need a bomb. (“You da bomb” wasn't a saying yet). As it turned out what everyone was so upset about was the bomb that had gone off in Olympic Park thirty minutes prior to my dad and I arriving at the Copper Kettle. In fact, the last place we had been was the exact spot where it was set off. We didn't have a clue. I had heard no sirens or any explosion or noticed any more activity than what is usually going on in downtown Atlanta. Dad and I were completely oblivious to the whole thing, but since this was before cell phones were so commonplace, we hadn't been reachable since we weren't at home. They all knew I adored going to the park, I collected hundreds of those pins and spent all my time there. I suppose they all figured I'd been blown to smithereens. Nope. Not me. I was probably too busy wandering around seeing if I could hold a door open for a serial murderer.

Tuesday, October 22, 2013

Stupid in the City, part 1.


It is 8:32 at night and I am writing my blog as I promised to do for NaBloPoMo on BlogHer. However, I have run into the unfortunate problem that nothing has been funny today. Not from my point of view anyway. I am currently in that lunar cycle that they should rename your “lunatic cycle” of the month and I hate everyone. I don't hate people as bad as I hate Osama Bin Laden, just more often. As nothing would make me laugh today except possibly the annihilation of mankind, I thought I would share a true story with you about myself. This is Tena's favorite story about me and I remembered it while I was in the shower. No, I wasn't thinking of Tena in the shower... unless you're into that, and then maybe I was. Anyway...

I lived in Atlanta GA during the summer of the 1996 Olympics. My dad lived right on Peachtree street and I really did have a great summer. I went to Olympic park almost every day, went to the rhythmic gymnastics event, a baseball game and a basketball game. Either the baseball or basketball game was the American team against somebody, I can't remember now, but it was cool to see America unite in a sportsman-like manner and kick some international butt. I wandered all over Atlanta, completely unsupervised and I was only fifteen years old. I was in heaven. However, if you are going to spend money in heaven, you have to have a job in heaven and I did. I was a waitress at a coffee house / greasy spoon called the Copper Kettle. It is exactly like a Waffle House except for the name. The sign is even spelled in individual yellow blocks with black letters. This was the very same restaurant; I think the only difference in the menu was, you could order either pancakes or waffles, whereas at Waffle House, you were limited to waffles for fried breakfast batter.

I really did love working there. I met people from all over the world because we were owned by a Holiday Inn that was next door and of course it was packed with tourists. I was nice to everybody and everybody was nice to me, including a cop that asked me on a date without knowing I was fifteen. Upon telling him how old I was that was the first time I had ever seen anyone turn the color of cottage cheese. There were noisy happy french guys with long hair and an Eastern Indian guy who wanted an English muffin every morning with orange juice and a milk. People from everywhere. There were also homeless people that would come in and sit down as long as they could just to rest and drink coffee. One man in particular, that I will call Charlie, used to come in and sit in a booth and stretch out and doze on and off. Some of the other waitresses would toss him out because he was taking up time in a paying booth (booths are worth more because you can get more people in them. Short order waitresses hate it when one person comes in and sits in a booth. That's why they have the barstools), but I usually let him just snooze for a while. I would have never had the heart to throw a homeless person out of an air conditioned building in the middle of summer in Atlanta Georgia. Especially considering they wear everything they own. I saw Charlie almost every day and he got to where he would sit in my section because I didn't mind him.

I would work my butt off from four in the morning to noon, count my tips and leave, or if I worked the night shift I would work from three in the afternoon until eleven or twelve at night. I wore a black apron with huge pockets in which I stashed my tips throughout the day. I could clear $200 easy on a steady night and I was saving it all to buy my first car. So one night I took out the garbage bags to the great big metal dumpsters behind the restaurant, popped a cigarette between my lips and heaved the few bags inside, took a final drag off of my Marlboro and squashed it out in the parking lot. When I turned back around in the pitch black night I was looking down the barrel of a gun with Charlie attached to the other end of it. I think I said something profound like, “whoa”. Charlie was shaky and he said in this weird voice “Give me your money; your tip money from your apron. Do it!”. I blinked and looked at him and broke out in the biggest laugh of my life. “Jesus Christ Charlie! You scared me to death! Put that damn thing away!”, I shook my head at the funny prank Charlie had pulled on me and laughed as I walked away back into the building. That Charlie! What a goober! Ha Ha! Boy he got me that time! “Give me your money!” Ha Ha! That was great! I thought someone was after me! Whoo boy! I went went back to work, finished my shift and went home.

Then next morning my dad notices ole Charlie on the news. Charlie had spent the evening robbing people at gunpoint and was now on the local morning news.

That's right ladies and gentlemen. I was too dumb to get robbed. A man held me up at gunpoint and I thought it was a joke and walked away laughing at him. Sheer stupidity kept me safe that night. Most people would go to Atlanta or Philly or Chicago and end up missing. Not me. I don't know when I'm actually in danger. I just naively wander the planet assuming the best of everyone and because I take nothing seriously, I can't even be robbed properly. I can't imagine why Charlie didn't shoot me or at least run after me. The only thing I can possibly figure is that he had worked all day on how to handle what he was going to do. He had prepared himself for crying, pleading and begging. He'd probably prepared for a fight and maybe he even had a hide out. But I guarantee you he had not prepared himself for a case of stupidity. I have this picture in my head of me walking away laughing hysterically and him behind me in the shadows. His gun droops like its made out of rubber and makes a sound like a deflating balloon and him standing there watching me and just dropping his head and saying sadly to himself “Okay”.

Tomorrow I will continue my absurd adventure in Atlanta with yet another criminal mastermind, my lack of mind and it is oddly enough set in the same restaurant. This will be yet another true story...

Monday, October 21, 2013

Choo can't be serious


Today I worked very hard to not get anything done. I have managed thus far to accomplish that, except now I am writing this blog which throws my plans off a little, but I hope to make up for it by making this post as useless and uninformative as possible. So, while I have been fully engaged in goofing off I clicked one of those adds that always runs up the right hand side of anything and everything you look at on the internet. It was for a website that was advertising purses for sale. I don't even have a choice when it comes to this type of advertisement. If they go to the trouble of putting a purse in their picture, my hand will automatically click their link. I love purses and handbags the way most people love their children, only I don't allow my handbags to get Popsicle residue on them. When I get to this site, which for practical purposes I will call the OohLaLa site, I see that they have not only purses, but shoes and bedding and clothes and even a whole section dedicated to cashmere. I am so happy that I found OohLaLa. I know that we will become close.

Naturally the first thing I did was click on the big square that showed all the purses (I could already smell that new purse smell) and wait for the clearance deals to come to me. When my poor, slow internet finally quit making that obnoxious little circle in the corner of the tab, and the page was fully loaded, I looked at the page and my eyeballs dried up into little sandy orbs, shattered and fell into my lap like a piece of broken terra-cotta. I couldn't believe my dehydrated eyes! I've never seen a clearance sale like this. The third purse in was a Hermes Brown Calf Box Leather Kelly Sellier 35cm bag on clearance for $8999.00. Just so you don't think you read that wrong, that is eight thousand nine hundred and ninety nine dollars of money! On Clearance. I backed away from the screen afraid they might charge me for just having had the temerity to pull it up on my computer. They can trace those IP addresses! I swallowed a lump in my throat and made sure I was the only person in the room and scrolled down the screen to look at more of these handbags. Then I got up and shut my bedroom door, because I have one kid at home and you don't want him walking in on you looking at something like that! As I scrolled down this list of clutches, totes, hobos and satchels I felt more and more shame. I realized that up to this point, true story, I have never paid Eight thousand dollars for a car. Granted, I drive little turd cars that don't impress anyone, but that purse was more valuable than my current automobile. Then as I became confident that the kid was occupied in his own room and probably wouldn't walk in on me, I slipped under my quilt and clicked on the shoes tab. Jimmy Choos, Minolo Blaniks, (which may not be spelled right), those shoes they buy by the dozen on Sex in the City... these shoes are the price of a house payment. And most of this stuff is on sale! Granted, I could get a pair of Jimmy Choos for only $300, but this shoe had a five inch stiletto heel that was alarmingly skinny. I've seen roofing nails that were thicker, and it had one patent leather tiny strap across the toe and another teensy strip across the ankle. This shoe practically didn't exist and they still wanted $300 for it. Now, I agree that I see no reason for Payless Shoe stores to remain open. Their shoes fit horribly, they hurt your feet and they self destruct after two weeks, very much like a letter to James Bond. No one ever said that store was a blessing on the shoe community, but I could buy my own Payless store chain for what they want for some of these shoes!

The scary part is that as you scroll down these pages of handbags and shoes, they leave up the pictures of what has sold out. Someone is buying this stuff. It makes me wonder if this is like Oprah's idea of Wal-Mart. She goes to this shop for the blue light specials and congratulates herself on being so very thrifty. Yes, I do realize celebrities spend ungodly amounts of clothes on their wardrobes, and that doesn't really bother me. They do have to work for their money and sell their bodies and no doubt their souls at some point, so that's fine. But I'm not sure celebrities would shop at this site. It looks to me like it's geared toward middle America. Your everyday Joesephine who maybe has a few extra credit cards. I always knew and was fine with the fact that America had this elite list of fabulously wealthy people: Bill Gates, actors, Wall Street CEO's, but they all seemed very separate from me. I assumed I was the majority. This site has unflinchingly pointed out to me that I am absurdly poor and that I will never be able to even smell an Hermes bag, much less own one.

Then I remembered that even if I were to somehow end up with one of these fabulous bags, some fairy godmother just plopped one in my lap, I would 1. Never take it out because I wouldn't want it to get messed up; and 2. Be that obnoxious person who works the product name of my bag into every conversation about everything at any time. “Oh, I'm so sorry you're upset. Here, let me pull a tissue out of my Louis Vitton bag. You'll notice the soft calf-leather handles that I need to set to each side as I dig in my Louis Vitton bag for your tissue. Now don't cry dear, your tears will spot the supple leather of my Louis Vitton bag”. Oh, yes, I would be that girl, I just know I would.

So, I will happily go back to buying my purses at ROSS and TJMaxx and buying my shoes in the mall and buying my clothes at any online sale I can find, because really, it's just going to be out of style in another season anyway (Not that that will make me stop wearing it. I'll just be wearing stuff that was in fashion a decade ago). And, in the meantime, when the kids aren't home and the hubby is off at work I can always sneak in my room, shut the blinds and lock the door, slip under the covers and look at handbags on the internet. No one has to know.

Thursday, October 17, 2013

If I kneed you I'll call


Well, I have once again messed up my knee. This is not a new injury, this is a recurring one that won't just go away. There is this goop (that is a proper medical term) that gets all up under and around my kneecap and pushes it up and around and all out of whack. My kneecap doesn't actually dislocate, which is good because there is no pain comparable to that, even childbirth, and I've had both happen. It just makes my muscles spasm together tightly around my kneecap in response to an injury and I can't get the goop to un-inflame long enough to push all the goop back where it is supposed to go. The real bummer is, the ER doctor can't push the goop back where it goes either when it gets this messed up. I know, I went to see him last night. He confirmed that it was in fact messed up, stuck a needle full of morphine in my butt and sent me home where he has suggested I call an orthopedic surgeon.

I knew he was going to say that nonsense about the surgeon. Every time I do this to my knee, a doctor, with presumably very little education, tells me I have to have surgery on it. Well, friends, that's not going to happen. I've had knee surgery on this same knee before. Do you know how bad it hurts? For weeks, it hurts! And I can't put even the teensy tiniest bit of pressure on it for eight weeks. Yeah, right. I have three teenagers at the house. Can you imagine what they would do once they figure out that mom can't run them down and beat them with a pepperoni stick? It would be chaos. It would be chaos just out of my reach, is what it would be. Do you know how messy three teenagers are. I have one with ADD, one who isn't really into showering and hygiene and another who is a man-diva and changes clothes no less than four times a day. These people cannot be left unsupervised. I have to yell at one to do his laundry while forcibly holding another under the shower head and making him brush his teeth, all the while making sure the other one doesn't fall into a daydream and wander off a cliff. These people could cause the apocalypse at any given time, and I am just supposed to sit on the couch and watch the end of days? No.

Then there is Dan. Dan is a wonderful man who is sweet tempered and hard working and I cannot leave him alone in the kitchen. He has something wrong with sinuses and has had since he was about ten years old and he can't smell. Your sense of smell directly effects your sense of taste. Therefore he cannot taste anything either. But he has the spirit! He really wants to smell and taste! This causes him to put so many herbs and spices on food that they are inedible to the rest of us. He cannot tell which spices go together either, so he may put half of a ginger root in the Italian food or half a bottle of Indian Curry in the tacos. And he can tell when something is spicy hot, so he adores red pepper in all forms. Flakes, pastes, powdered, bottled, he doesn't care, just throw it all in. As long as eating it makes you instantly turn red and break into a sweat, he's a happy guy. If your mouth isn't swollen at the end of dinner, he feels he has personally failed you. And he's so nice, that failing you really upsets him.

Then there is the idea of surgery itself. Do any of you know what happens during surgery? Anyone? They go inside of your body. That's right! Despite the fact that you are all nice and sealed up, they just break right in. They will cut you open and dig around in your insides and play hide and seek with the surgery sponge in there. If God had meant for people to go inside of my body to fix things, he would have made a door. Somewhere on me there would be a little door with an inset handle (you know, so it didn't look like I had a wart) and all you'd have to do would be to open this door and fix whatever the problem was. Like when the lights go out in the kitchen because I have run the dishwasher and microwave at the same time (God bless houses from the 1920's), I just go to the breaker box, open the little door and flip the switch. Good as new! I have no little door! Stay out of the inside of my body! I do not approve of being viciously gashed open by God knows what kind of psychopath in a doctor's coat (and you can buy those things online, I've seen them) so he can go in and poke and prod and “take a look” and when I wake up he tells me some cock-and-bull story about being fixed. He probably didn't even do anything productive in there. He'll just look around, make fun of my knobby kneecaps to the nurses, drink coffee, play with my tendons to see what he can make my toes do, listen to James Brown and then stitch me back up. “Oh, yeah, Ms. Ledford, we fixed you up real good” and he snickers into his coat sleeve as the orderly snorts coffee out his nose in a fit of hysterical laughter. I am not to be fooled that easily. So, if they don't mind, I will keep my body firmly sealed just like it was made and I will leave the goop in my knee to settle down wherever it pleases. Until it starts hurting again.

Wednesday, October 16, 2013

Superstar!


Yesterday I did not post a blog. I would like to say this was because I was doing something heroic, like pulling puppies out of a burning orphanage so that the kids I had already rescued would have their beloved pets. Or maybe because I was doing something really cool. “So, yeah, I didn't really have time to write my blog because Justin Timberlake came by the house and picked me up to go have dinner with him and Jessica Biel right before went backstage at the Maroon 5 concert”. Or even if I could have been doing something noble; for instance I couldn't write because I was feeding the homeless and someone stole my laptop and I said it was okay because they needed it far more than I did. And after I made that declaration, the thief brought the laptop back to me, tears streaming down his face and he apologized for his misdeed. I realized he just needed it to feed his family, so we went together and sold the laptop and I gave him all of the money for it. I would love to say that. The truth however, is, I forgot. I have a really good reason for forgetting though. I spent the first two-thirds of the day goofing off and then fell asleep and then woke up just in time to shower and get ready for... KARAOKE!

I love karaoke. I love the smokey bar (yes, in Virginia people still smoke in some bars), even though I don't smoke anymore I like the smell. I like the people who are having a good time, the guys that flirt with you because they are too drunk to pay attention to your BMI and for now you look like America's next top model. I love the laughing and the dancing and the lights and I adore the loud music. I find karaoke sounds better and better as the night goes on. By the time a person is six green jell-o shots in, everyone sounds good. I don't know why some of these people are not on the radio. Unless! Unless you are so very bad that even drunk people will notice. There are always one of these singers sometimes more, but at least one every time; and God love their hearts, they clap for me every single time I get up there too. For instance, remembering P!nk's performance at the 2011 Grammy Awards Show, I got up last night and sang Glitter In The Air. My rendition would have made P!nk cry. Really. Probably she would have needed puppet therapy. I broke that song, but I had a great time doing it. Had I had the time, I was up to slaughter a perfectly good Evanescence song too, but it was time to go.

You know, for the life of me, I can't figure out what happens when I get out of my car. When I'm in my car, I sound just like P!nk. For that matter, I sound just like Aretha Franklin. I sound even better than she did! Move over girl and give me some R-E-S-P-E-C-T, because I am the greatest singer in the world! What you want? Baby I got it! Whatchu need? You know I got it! Can I sing Cher songs in the car? Honey, if she could turn back time, she'd have turned it back and had me sing for her so that she would get even more famous! I am a rock goddess in the car. All singers bow to me and pay me tribute and worship my vocal cords. I crank the music up all the way and I know in my heart that The Love Shack and my car are both where it's at. But then I get out of my car to go into the karaoke bar and I seem to leave the magical bubble of singing abilities at the car. I think my car must have this musical force-field around it and when one walks out of this force-field, one can no longer sing without the risk of dehydrating someone else's eyeballs. I confidently stride up to the KJ, slip him my piece of paper and wait, giddy with anticipation until he calls me up to entertain the masses. I try to make the cane I have to walk with look cool somehow (Like “Look, she comes with her own mini-stripper pole) and I get the microphone in my hand. My dear KJ, Allen, has learned to turn the microphone off while he's pulling up the song, because if you give me dead space and a microphone I will put the two to use in any way that bounces into my head. “...and here's my Bill Clinton impression!” So, yeah, Allen turns the mic off. Then my song comes on and I am up! This is my moment! I open my mouth and the magic begins! Have you ever heard a cement mixer rotate gravel while someone scratches their nails down a chalkboard in a musical manner? Well, that sounds better than me. But I have so much fun! Nobody cares that I sound like someone being raped by a moose, they buy more drinks, cheer me on and clap like mad when I'm finished. I've never heard one “boo”. Everyone knows the unwritten rules are, if you don't have the guts to get up there and do it yourself, then you don't get to criticize those who do, and if you can do it better, put your money where your mouth is and get up and sing it. But no one gets mean. No matter how many songs I sign up to destroy in one night, I have always left with my self esteem intact and a dob of jell-o shot on my chin.

For now it's back to raising kids and cleaning bathrooms and doing laundry I will never catch up on, but occasionally I am a rock star!

Monday, October 14, 2013

I'm gettin' a gun


I have had it up to HERE with nature! It's everywhere out there! I'm not even talking about normal nature; no, I live in the mountains and the nature out here is gigantic. This is not your everyday nature. And if it isn't ginormous nature, it's exceedingly clever nature. Seriously, something is wrong with the general population of animals, insects and reptiles at my house.

First off, no matter what species of thing is roaming in and around my house, they all have mad skills. I'm talking about animals that would win Jeopardy, come back as returning champions five times until they got bored and eat Alec Trebek for dinner. You may recall the story of Ninja Mouse, for example. Now this was a mouse who got through six lazy cats, four psychotic dogs and a useless goat. Then, when he got inside he was not repelled by the mint oil I dab in the cabinets and pantry which I do based on the idea that mint oil will deter mice. He did not care that my kitchen usually smells like a toothpaste factory, it didn't bother him in the least. Then I set out a trap for this mouse and it poopied on the trap. That was just vulgar in my book and went too far. So I set out ten mouse traps all over the place and one live trap and after a week that little rodent finally went into the live trap. He didn't have anywhere else to go! There was literally no where to walk that wouldn't have snapped him up. He knew though, that if he went in the live trap I would be forced to let him go, as I cannot kill anything that ever starred in a Disney movie. He was a tiny, itty bitty black mouse that looked up at me through the see through top and asked for some water. I drew the line at hospitality, but I made sure he was set free at the end of the road that night so he wouldn't go hungry.

Then this Saturday, I was mopping my kitchen floor, because I'm wild like that now, and I noticed a bee of some sort fly by my legs but didn't see it go any further. I wasn't too concerned, but for some reason I made a mental note of this. So I mopped and cleaned and did my thing and later got an apple and sat on my bed. Well, I almost sat all the way down, but something poked me in the back of the leg. I felt around there and could feel something in my loose lounge pants, so I stood up and dropped trou in the middle of the floor, assuming maybe it was a leaf or something caught in there. You can imagine my surprise then when I looked down into my pants and found a HORNET walking around in there! Yes, a live hornet was in my pants while I was in my pants! I have no idea how long the little pervert had been in there, but I can assume since I lost sight of the bee thing in the kitchen. What does one do when one has their pants around their ankles and between those ankles is a hornet enjoying a leisurely Saturday afternoon stroll? Well, you slip your feet out of the leg holes as gently as possible and then fold the pants over on themselves, grab a big tennis shoe and beat the daylights out of those pants until there cannot possibly be anything left in them but hornet soup. Then you beat them some more. Then you set them on fire and walk away. And here's the crazy part: I wasn't concerned at seeing the bee-like thing fly by me because they are always in my kitchen. I have sprayed the slit by the left window where they come in, so usually there is a yellow-jacket or five wandering drunkenly around my kitchen banging into the windows until it finally falls on the floor in a fit of convulsions and writhes around until it later dies. Yes, I feel guilty about this too. I can imagine them reaching out to me “Help me! Help me! Oh God, it hurts! Aaaaahhhhhgggggg”. At the end of every single day I sweep my floors and toss out a pile of around fifteen yellow-jackets and hornets. I forgot to mention while the yellow-jackets found their way in the left window, about two weeks ago, hornets started coming in the right window. It's like living in a Stephen King novel and there will be no human survivors left.

Then tonight, just as my darling daughter was about to go take a shower, I hear this blood curdling, ear piercing scream “WAAAAAAAGGGGGHHHHH”. I'm already grabbing the Raid and I go down the hallway to rescue the princess. There is a cave cricket on the wall daring her to cross it's path and enter the bathroom. This cricket's antenna were as long as my fingers though. It had these long spider-like legs that reached two inches out from it's body up and then down. This damn thing could have jumped to Mars in a single bound. It actually had the temerity to ask me how I was doing and would I bring it a sandwich! I grabbed my can of Raid and sprayed this cricket. And sprayed. And sprayed. And sprayed. The cricket (I swear I am not making this up) lifted it's arm so I could get it's armpit. I turned that thing white with spray. That's how I know how long it's antenna were, because the whole thing was covered in a thick white coating. After I had done his underarms for him, he turned and sauntered off into the bathroom and refused to die until I sent a large human man in after him. He was rude. He was sassy. He was simply intolerable.

Something has to be done. We have a bear, which I mind less than the spiders I see. We have a toad that sits on the porch who is so big that the dogs won't go near it. We have stink bugs in droves. We have hornet sex offenders (can you imagine what that thing could have stung???) I live in a house of bug horrors and they never even help with the dishes. Clearly Raid is useless against these mutated super-bugs; so I am going to buy a rifle. I will buy a big gun with huge bullets and I will dare a bug to come in my house again. Nature? Come at me bro.

Friday, October 11, 2013

A Walk to Laugh At


Dog thoughts:

Koo: “Oh boy! We're on a walk with the girl human! I love the humans. I'm going to walk right next to her ankles to prove how much I love her.”

Me: *As I'm trying to rapidly walk up and down my road in an effort to lose weight I fall over the dog “WAAAAHHHHGGGG, Dammit Koo”

Koo: “Oh boy, oh boy! The human talked to me. She loves me! I'm going to wag my tail and prance down the road so that all of the other dogs know how much my human loves me. She's such a good human!” *pant pant pant. *Pees on the neighbor's fence post “I own that.”

Lucky: “Wait up guys! I'm too fat to go fast! I'm trying to – A PUDDLE! WOO HOO! My day is made!” *rolls around in the muddy water just long enough to emerge looking like a stray dog with mange.

Koo: “Lucky stop. Oh, the humiliation.” *Pees on each of the neighbor's rose bushes “I own those.”

Lucky: “Dude! You gotta try this! Hey mom! Look how great I look!” *with one bound jumps halfway up my body and smears mud from my waistline to my ankles while simultaneously knocking me over.

Me: “GAAAAHHHHH! Lucky, no, bad dog. No jumping! You weigh one hundred and fifty pounds you big barrel!” *I keep walking knowing I'll have to bathe later anyway. I ignore the limp I have acquired from having an obese Labrador jump on me.

Lucky: “Oh! It's too much! The human loves – DEER!” *tongue hanging out and smile from ear to ear she tears off through the trees to hunt the deer that left it's scent there last week.

Koo: “Stupid dog.” *Pees on the nearby pine tree “I own that.”

Me: “Lucky! Come back! Come – oh, never mind... Just don't bring back the bear or a skunk.”

Lucky: *At this point she has no thoughts. She is high on deer and is crashing, face first, through the trees and bushes with the conviction that today will be the day she brings down the beast.

Koo: *peeing on the neighbor's ornamental grass “I own that.” *Finds the neighbor's male cat. Humps it. “I own him.”

Me: “Koo, stop it, that's a boy. And it's a cat. He can do nothing for you”.

Koo: “Silly human, I am not bigoted.” *Pees on the cat so he can find him later “I'll call you.”

Lucky: *wandering aimlessly further down the road “Oh, hi! It's a human! Whatcha doing? Are you out for a walk? I'll go too. I don't know how I got here, really. This isn't where I live. Do you know where I live? Okay, I love you.” *Tries to walk between my legs so that she can show her affection for the seemingly new person she has run across.

Me: *stopping mid stride to avoid breaking my neck “Yes Lucky, I love you too. Go on baby.”

Lucky: “The human named me! Oh wow! This is the best day ever! If I follow her she might take me home! I wonder if she – SQUIRREL!” *Crashes through the neighbor's flower bed, pays no attention to the barbed wire fence as she squirms through it and dashes off into the trees

Me: “Okay.”

Koo: “Hey human, I now own a mini-van, but I'm not sure how to drive it.”

We pass a shallow puddle and Koo see's a neighbor out in their yard. He immediately drops his tail, sucks his stomach in, cocks one ear over endearingly and makes his eyes as big as saucers. Then he walks over and meekly takes a few slurps out of the puddle looking at the neighbor pleadingly. He doesn't have any water anywhere at home, does the neighbor mind if he takes a few sips of the leftover rain water laying out in the road? Pretty please? The neighbor gives me a look that plainly asks how I could abuse and starve such a sweet animal, and Koo, realizing his job is done walks off with a jaunty air.

Lucky is meandering down the middle of the road and spies us. She can't believe her luck at finding a human way out here! The human calls to her and she realizes the human has just named her! This is the best day ever!

Thursday, October 10, 2013

Took a licking and kept on ticking


I would just like to say I am the undisputed champion of licking my kid. In the battle royal, I have emerged victorious though wounded and broken. Tonight began like any other evening. At dinner our family had the usual polite conversation involving Keli's story of accidentally burning what appears to be a Nike symbol in his leg with a heat gun. This was followed by a pants-leg-up demonstration and visual aid to the burn. Robin wished for a longer tongue and I showed him mine which he admired immensely and wanted to know if I could touch my nose with it. Alexis informed us that our DNA is all very closely related to a banana, so I called the banana I was eating “uncle” and bit it. All the phones were piled in the middle of the table so no one could text during dinner, because, you know, we wouldn't want the kids to miss any of that. Keli showed us why he was turning his phone face down as there was a scantily clad woman as his screen saver and he figured it wasn't appropriate for dinner if the picture should come on. He showed us this picture during dinner. Thankfully it was just a woman in jeans and a small top with a lot of tattoos. Alexis cut the fat off of her pork chop and fed it to the dog while asking him if he enjoyed his chicken fat and Dan shoveled food in and pretended we weren't there. So, all in all, a good night.

Well, Robin's tongue question seemed to lead his brain to think it was a good idea to lick my face. Promptly after dinner, while I still had banana in my mouth that little twerp sidled up to me and licked my cheek. Oh, so you wanna play? I was up chasing him full speed through the house and he made a mouse-like screech and ran to his room and locked the door. I knew he was in there! Trapped like a rat! I licked my hand with as much saliva as possible and waited by the door. Keli peeped out and Robin squealed “Don't open the door, dude!” I made a covert “shush” sign to Keli and he being the good son he is closed the door and assured Robin he didn't see anything. I hadn't long to wait and my enemy peeped out of his room and as I jumped around the corner he gave a yelp and slammed the door shut again. The saliva in my hand now being cold and pretty nasty, I wiped it on a dirty towel just as Keli opened the door and I jumped in. Robin, pleaded for his life, but I showed no mercy. I tackled him and we crashed to the bed as I tried in vain to lick his face or hands. I have to give it to the bugger, he was swift and crafty. He pulled out his Limited Edition Dr. Who Sonic Screwdriver and aimed it at me and made the wooopwoooopwoooop noise, but I fearlessly dodged the green laser of death and came at him like a drooling anteater of doom. He outmaneuvered me and threw me off of him just before I was able to land a big slobbery tongue on him and he ran, laughing maniacally, out of the room. Undaunted, I gave chase. In the living room, we had an intense stand off. I stood behind the couch, blocking his only chance to retreat back to his room. I made my eyes wide and smiled wide only revealing my top teeth. This seemed to terrify the enemy and he spent much time in the kitchen walking back and forth, begging me to go away and stop looking at him that way. I only smiled wider and in a mild voice told him to try and get past me. At this, the poor boy broke down into what I can only assume was a hysterical fit, of giggles. He grabbed a kitchen chair and made his way past me like a lion tamer approaching the ferocious beast. Sensing that I could not overcome a chair pointed threateningly in my direction, I opted to let him pass. The silly fool put down the chair however and I streaked after him like lightning while he screamed for dear life and bolted down the hallway. We danced the timeless dance of warriors in battle for several minutes until my knight in shining armor came into view. My son, Keli, came within my sight and I made the universal signal for him to put his brother in a headlock. He softly approached Robin and sauntered next to him as though entrapping him was the furthest thing from his mind. Then he sprung like a cat. Keli head-locked the savage and fell backwards with him into the hallway at which point he wrapped his legs around the enemy's body (Keli is 6'3”, he can pretty much wrap around anything) and pinned him to the ground. Seeing my conquest within my grasp, I piled on the two writhing boys and with Keli's help, I LICKED THE WHOLE LEFT SIDE OF ROBIN'S HEAD! I cannot say it tasted nice, but it tasted like victory and that is always sweet. I jumped up and did the Hero Of The Day Dance which involved hip thrusts and the words “uh huh, oh yeah” several times. It turns out I had not thought my plan entirely through however. Keli let go of Robin and that became problematic. The young scoundrel bounded up and chased me into my own room and tackled me as I reached the safety of the mattress. I called out for my wing man, Keli, but before he could save me from the savage, Robin licked me back in the eyeball. I say that was unnecessary warfare tactics and I plan on filing a war crimes suit against the cad. He seemed to be of the opinion that licking my eyeball was offensive to him and made noises to indicate he was grossed out by the occurrence. I think, however, it was a blitz attack and he was simply using the “grody” maneuver to cover for his aggressive tactics. After I cleared my eye of the majority of the saliva, we bobbed around and traded pokes and punches. Well, I punched and he laughed when I did it, but I think it was all false bravado. At one point he did pull a “no fair” decree when my diamond ring accompanied a well placed arm punch. I don't think it was the diamond poking him though; I am certain it was my might and battle skills wearing him down and causing him unbearable amounts of excruciating pain. Of this I am proud.

So yes, my right eye still burns a little from the tongue thrust into it in such an unsporting fashion. And I had to wash my face again to get the feeling of battle spit and grit off of it. But overall, I am proud of how I defended my honor and the honor of mothers everywhere. You have a sixteen year old teenage boy? Take him down! I brought mine down with a good, old fashioned licking, and you can too!

Wednesday, October 9, 2013

zzzzzzzzz........


I am writing today's blog during a brief moment of consciousness which could end at any time. If I can stay awake long enough, I will explain.

For the last several days I have been so sleepy that I have had to take naps in between naps because I found them too exhausting. I have slept all night, gotten up in the mornings and zombie shuffled my way around my house until about 9am at which point I would crash into bed and sleep until 1pm. I'd wake up, have a peach or plum which I would eat with my head facing down so I didn't accidentally fall asleep and choke on the pit, shuffle back to bed, sleep until 4pm, make dinner for my family – at this point I'm hoping it was always made out of standard food products and not, say, shoes – and I would ooze back to bed and not eat or wake up until morning at which point I would do this all over again. If my brain was active for enough time, I usually decided I must be getting sick and my body is sleeping to fight off whatever crud was invading it. I had not counted on my attention span as being the reason that I couldn't remain upright for more than ten minutes at a time.

Anyone who personally knows me knows that I have to take a vast number of various medications. I got blessed with the garbage disposal of my family's gene pool and all the stuff no one else wanted, they gave to me. I have taken so much medicine for so long that I don't even have to look at the labels anymore and can even tell you what medicine is in the bottle by just listening to the sound the pills make when you shake the bottle (I got bored one day). So at night I just grab a bottle, open it, dump out the required number of pills and move on to the next bottle. Sometimes I do have to dump out more than one pill because my insurance will normally only pay for the lowest dose on a prescription. One prescription I have requires me to take 60 milligrams. My insurance won't pay for the 60 mg capsule, but it will pay for me to take three of the 20 mg capsules. Go figure. Anyway, I was groggily looking for my morning medicine at seven this morning and I was digging through my box o' pills to find the right bottle. You know how sometimes you will see something, but you don't realize what it is right away? It's like your brain puts it in the in-box, checks it's messages, gets some tea, talks to some of the other organs then comes back and starts on the stuff that got put in the in-box. Well, after I dug out the right bottle, took the right pill, put the lid back on the bottle and was about to close the box, my brain got to the top paper of the in-box and read the memo that said “Look at that Baclofen bottle again”. Baclofen is some kind of muscle relaxer I have to take every day to ward off tension headaches which quickly turn into debilitating migraines. I knitted my brows, plunged my hand back in the box and dug around until I found the bottle of Baclofen, which reads “Take a half tablet every night before bed for muscle tension”. Oh no. Oh, really! OH NO! That explains so much! I got that refilled several days ago and just dropped it in the box. They changed the dose. I have been taking TWO of these pills every single night! I did not read the label, I just kept on taking the stupid things without ever thinking that they might have made the pills FOUR TIMES STRONGER and had me only take half of one! Dear God! It's a wonder I've been able to stay awake at all! My muscles should be so relaxed at this point that I am probably made less of muscle and more like pulled taffy! Well that explains why I can't stay awake, because I know very few alert puddles. Jeez, are you kidding me?

So if you will all excuse me, I am going to go back to bed for a while and sleep of my months worth of muscle relaxers. I've laid a towel down to catch the drool and I hear they make diapers that fit grown-ups. I'm gonna have to check those babies out!

My guardian angel probably has his hand smacked firmly to his forehead by now.

Tuesday, October 8, 2013

I'd like some cheese with my whine


Today I am cheating just a little on my I've-never-done-this-in-my-life blog and am tweaking it just a little bit to I-haven't-done-this-in-fourteen-years blog. Today I put on a size fourteen blue jeans and they fit just fine. Now, some of you out there will be thinking “Oh sweet baby Jesus, that's a big woman!” I will deal with you later, hopefully when your back is turned. But some other people might be thinking “That is incredible! I can't believe you can finally fit in those!”. Those are the people I am talking to – the ones who saw me when I wore a size 24 jeans and were friends with me anyway.

I have now run into a problem though. I have heard this kind of problem labeled as First World Problems or White People Problems or even Skinny Girl Problems (though I am far from skinny yet). Get over it. I was so aggravated actually, that I realized how funny and absurd it was. I had somewhere I had to go and the weather being cold, I didn't want to wear a dress, plus I have a new sweater I wanted to wear. I keep my folded clothes and underthings in a seven foot tall, huge wardrobe cabinet and all of my jeans live on the very bottom. There are enough jeans in there to open a boutique. So, I start digging to find the perfect pair of jeans for my look. The first jeans I ran across were cute grey ones with rough edges. I decided those would be perfect and put them on and they promptly fell right back down around my ankles. I picked them up and looked at the size. They were a size 20. Well, that was okay, I had plenty of other jeans. Well, the next pair I picked up were 18's. Still too big, but not a problem. Then the next three pair I picked up were all size 20's and wouldn't fit me. So, I pulled a little footstool over and sat down to continue my dig. The next pairs were 22s and 24s! As I went down in the pile, the sizes kept going up in size! Then I panicked. Oh God! I don't have any clothes at all! I was ignoring all of the clothes in my closet and in the top part of the cabinet and was simply distraught that I had no pants. I can't go shopping without pants, though technically stores only seem to require shoes and a shirt. I started tossing all of the big pants out into a pile in the middle of the floor like girls do on TV shows when they have nothing to wear except all the great stuff that they do have to wear. Out of all of the pants I owned, do you know how many fit me? Two. I am now the proud owner of two pair of pants. I gave so many jeans to give to Goodwill that they fill up an entire kitchen bag, which I had to bag twice because the drawstring broke on the first bag. Now don't get me wrong, I'm tickled that I can give these pants to someone who could use them. I am not tickled over the idea of spending a good deal of time of my immediate future in pajama pants. I'll never be able to shop anywhere but Wal-Mart if that happens, though on the bright side, I will probably be voted most popular girl there. Going to any party besides a slumber party will be out of the question, and when I do dishes I'm either going to have to do them in a Sunday dress or a negligee. I can see me in one of the bridesmaids gowns on that are in my closet with my hair pulled back and big rubber gloves on cleaning toilets and scrubbing walls.

You know, I had always taken pants for granted. Even when I didn't have pants I necessarily liked, I still had them. And if I didn't have them, I could buy them. Well, I'm currently experiencing life as a poor person, and I cannot buy pants. I'd have to sleep with a manager to get pants or something. Huh, in that case, I guess not having the pants would be a bonus and things would be finished more quickly, but still; have you seen most store managers? Rarely have I ever walked into JC Penny's and found anyone there that I would want to sleep with in exchange for clothes. I somehow think that all store managers look like Drew Carey.

So there I sat, in the floor, crying because I had to give away all of my big girl jeans because I was too thin to wear them. It took me a minute to realize I was being one of the people that I had always wanted to beat up. Seriously? I'm bitching because I lost the weight I was trying to lose? Well, bless my heart. And that's why I feel like a big goober tonight. I wonder if I'm the kind of person who if I didn't have something to gripe about, I would gripe about not having anything to gripe about. I may just be a perpetually unsatisfied person. Man, I hate discovering things about my personality; because I usually find myself an annoying person to be around. I'm going to go record my laugh now and see if I have an obnoxious giggle.

Monday, October 7, 2013

I need eye bleach


This weekend I witnessed something that may actually scar me for life. I went to a birthday party for a five year old who has an older and a younger sister, so there were little girls and boys there raging in age from a few years old to ten or eleven years old. The party was fun and I stayed late into the night visiting with my friend who is the mother of the birthday girl. A sleepover was being held that night, so we all piled in the living room and dragged a mattress in for all the little kids to sleep on – and incidentally jump on – and put the television on one of those stations way at the end of the channels that plays just music; no videos or anything. The channel the kids wanted was of course the pop music channel and so they all danced around and shouted out the wrong lyrics to a bunch of top 40 songs. Two of the girls had taken ballet for a bit and whirled and twirled like ballerinas to every song that came on whether it was a Bruno Mars love song or an Eminem rap song and two of the older girls were taking hip-hop classes and busted out some of their moves. All in all, we were having a pretty good time, laughing and singing and dancing. Then...

One little girl, whom I found out is in 2nd grade, which means she is six or possibly seven years old, had not had any dance lessons and was apparently not content with jumping around and making up her own moves. My friend had gone into the kitchen to make some food and I was left alone with all eight kids. So, this little girl ran up to me with her little freckled face beaming at me and her eyes shining and her soft little hair pulled up in a pony-tail and said “Hey watch me! Watch me!”. I said okay and I watched. This tiny child was in a purple t-shirt and hot pink tight shorts; the shorts were made like leggings, only they were short. This child proceeds to spread her legs, touch her fingertips to the floor, stick her tiny butt up in the air and, lets face it, her ooh-hoo all exposed and starts twerking. I was shocked. It was the most repulsive and heartbreaking thing I have ever witnessed. For those of you who don't know what twirking is, it's what Miley Cyrus did at the Grammys that grossed everyone out. It is a dance that looks like you are having sex from behind, as the twirking is usually done with your ooh-hoo mashed up against a man's pelvis and you bounce and grind. My mouth just hung open for a second as I watched this little bitty child bend over and bounce her butt up and down as fast as it would go so it would jiggle. Then she varied her dance by bringing her fingertips up from the floor to about waist high, still bent over twirking for dear life. My stomach actually rolled. I have no idea who's child this was or even what her name was, but I had to tell her she had to stop doing that. I wanted to put her in time out and take away her MTV privileges, but not having any idea who she is, it might be hard to enforce that.

Then after I swallowed the little bit I had thrown up in my mouth, I looked at her and she looked so hurt that I refused to watch her anymore. She kept running in front of me doing this and I would deliberately look at one of the other kids and pretend this child was invisible. I felt mean. I could just tell she was one of those kids that didn't get a lot of attention. You know how you can just kind of tell? They try too hard or something. She desperately wanted to impress me and the other kids, she needed that attention and I just couldn't watch what she was doing. I couldn't have been more sickened if I had been watching this six year old have sex. I know this is a graphic blog today and not particularly funny. I had started out trying to make it funny, but I find that I can't joke about how inappropriate this was.

You know, I didn't care when Miley Cyrus did it. She wasn't the only one, no one said a word about Robin Thicke who is married and has a kid; the female was the one called nasty names of course. But her career and all the people who work for her, agents, assistants, make-up artists, wardrobe designers, stage crew, everyone, depends on Miley getting publicity. Well, that is just what she did. She was talked about for days and days afterward and still gets made fun of and has jokes written about her on every on-line forum I've been on. Good for her. She is a grown woman who must stand out from a million other pop singers and she did it. She's no more vulgar than Madonna or Cher or Jennifer Lopez or any of the other women who have to use their bodies to sell their music. I don't hold her responsible for being a role model for anybody. I made sure I was the role model for my own kids and turned the television off when someone was doing something I didn't want my kids copying.

So my question is, who are the parents of this child? She's supposed to be innocent and playing with Barbies and Legos right now; not imitating rear-entry sex! She was so hungry for attention that she grabbed onto the first grown-up that looked like they might pay her some and did anything she could think of to earn praise and compliments like the other girls. And no child ever has made up that dance. Not the way she was doing it. You'd have thought she had taken twirking lessons or something. Obviously she is seeing these music videos and imitating what she witnesses. I guess if there is a moral to this story it is this: Please, parents, pay attention to what your kid is watching. My kids didn't have TVs in their own rooms until last year. My son bought it with his own money and he is going to be sixteen this month. So, clearly a child in the wild can survive up to 15 years without having a television in their room with unlimited access to shows. Put one TV in the living room and monitor what those six year old eyeballs are seeing. You'd be surprised.

Friday, October 4, 2013

I'll Be There For You


Due to the migraine headache that I have had for the past six days, I had to go to the doctor and get a shot of something that made me feel like I was walking around on the moon without a space suit. As a result of that, I have been in a puddle on the couch feebly pushing remote control buttons and I have landed on Friends. I forgot how great this show was! I have all ten seasons thanks to my friend, Kandi, and I have started at the beginning and I'm nearly done with season two. It's so funny to realize I say things and make gestures because of this show. You know: “Oh. My. God.” or how I pepper sentences with “you know”. I think I make facial expressions like Chandler. I never knew that until I started watching ridiculous amounts of Friends back to back. Did one show really influence my life so much? Well, I had the Rachael haircut. And I tend to pronounce “really” as “reeeelly”. I have lived with the delusion that I am a funny, unique individual with quirky speech patterns. They aren't conscious efforts at speech, I just assumed I was reeeeeelly clever. Turns out my entire repertoire of social interaction is a spin off of a ten year long script that everyone has already heard.

Then I keep looking at the clothes. Do you remember when jeans came all the way up to your belly button? I had forgotten, but in the first seasons, all the girls wear 'mom jeans'. I hadn't even realized how low slung jeans had gotten these days. I think the waist-lines just kept creeping further and further down our hips until everyone could see our thongs and now they seem to have reached a plateau. You know what else I noticed about the clothes? And I love this part; all the clothes were in neutrals and earth tones. I always love wearing chocolate brown, grey, cream, and sand colors. We seem to have made a return to the 80's and we are all wearing bright colors that look like they have been accidentally dropped in acid waste. Just as a note, I look horrible in neon colors. But in the 90's I was so comfortable. Even the vibrant colors were earth tones and colors found in nature. Oh! And wearing super baggy clothes was cute. You know, Rachel walks out in huge plaid pajama pants and a t-shirt three sizes too big for her and it's so adorable. You weren't forced to parade around in skin tight baby-doll tees, they actually had big, sloppy t-shirts that were sold and marketed for women. Today, if I want a shirt like that, I have to shop in the men's section. I miss baggy grey sweatshirts, jeans that didn't show my panties and big brown cable-knit sweaters and those big loose, sheer layers like Phoebe always wears. Wide legged pant suits with long, knee length flowing suit jackets and everyone woman at any party wearing almost the same – but not quite – little black dress.

I have to agree with today's lower rise jeans, those mom jeans tended to ride up a bit, so hip-huggers are just fine with me. I did have to spend $122.00 to get plain grey running shoes instead of neon pink trainers with lime green stitching and acid orange logos splashed all over it; so that's obnoxious, but, you know, you do what you have to. It's just been fun to go back and see that in the 90's we did have our own fashion look, our own slang, and our own defining TV shows.

After reading back through this, I want to apologize to those of you who realize that I am still high on that stuff that was in the needle from the doctor. I realize this has been a ramble about nothing and had I not signed up to write every single day, I would not have inflicted today's post on anyone.

NaBloPoMo

So that I don't keep forgetting where the site is that I joined and agreed to write everyday, here is my own personal note.  Feel free to join the group as well
http://www.blogher.com/nablopomo-soup-add-your-october-2013-posts?wrap=blogher-topics/blogging-social-media/nablopomo&crumb=113590

Thursday, October 3, 2013

Fine, here's your post


So, I said two days ago that I would 1. write my blog every day during October and 2. do something I had never done before every day. I'm not sure how many of you out there get migraine headaches. If you are wondering if you've ever had one, then you haven't. If you have, then you know that right now, looking at this screen through anti-glare glasses is like staring at the blazing sun in the desert at noon in August. You will also know that I don't remember the first sentence of this paragraph because my brain can only focus on the throbbing and trying not to throw up on my keyboard. You will excuse me if something is misspelled because it is hard to see the letters in between the blotches of white light and darting black dots in my vision. So, I am going to try to consolidate and do both tasks at once. Today, I am writing something on my blog that I have never written anywhere at any time in my whole life. Here goes:



Blah, Blah Blah!

Blah blah blah? Blah blah blah blah, blah blah blah blah (blah blah) blah. Blah blah blah. Blah blah blah, blah blah; blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah. Blah Blah, blah, blah blah blah, blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah. Blah blah. Blah blah blah blah, blah blah, blah blah blah. Blah blah, blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah – blah blah – blah blah blah. Blah blah blah blah. Blah, blah blah, blah, blah, blah blah blah. Blah blah blah blah blah blah blah, blah blah blah blah blah, blah blah blah blah blah blah! Blah Blah! Blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah.




Wednesday, October 2, 2013

Sticking with it


Hello adoring fans! (mom). Yesterday I said for the month of October, I would be trying something every day that I have never done before. For the first day of October I thought I had found a new source of almonds. As it turns out, my research department, Kandi Kirk, googled what I had put in my mouth and found out it was cyanide. Peach seeds are filled with cyanide. So, actually on the first of October, I tried cyanide. It isn't good. I didn't enjoy it at all.

I was at a loss about what to do today. I mean, how do you top cyanide? That's really a show-offy way to start the month. Then while cruising through my Kindle literature I ran across my copy of Fyodor Dostoyevsky's The Idiot. I have never read Dostoyevsky based on the fact that I'm not sure I can pronounce his name. It's kind of like food ingredients, you know, "If you can't pronounce it, don't eat it". Well I had always avoided Dostoyevsky backed by that theory, but the title The Idiot appealed to me. I am a slapstick and crude humor kind of girl, so because I adore my old literature and this was a title after my own heart, I couldn't resist reading something entitled The Idiot. I must discover who this idiot is and what makes him an idiot. So, I brought it up, and I'm reading it. Guess what? It isn't hard to read at all! Really! Some of the people's names make my tongue move in ways it's never had to before, but otherwise it's just a story, like Dickens or Twain. It's really a nice read. I think I'll keep this up.

Also, today, I did a second new thing – I'm an over achiever like that – I signed up to write a blog entry every day with a writing group. I'm not sure how it works yet. I just closed my eyes and jumped in. I might be doing it wrong, but I'm doing it! Bonus, I don't have to leave my house for either of these projects which means I am constantly in touch with Diet Coke and rash crème (yesterday's issue is still an issue); and I don't have to go outside and let nature get all over me or touch bugs or anything.

Also, because I am just this cool I promised a friend of mine to walk every single day, every day without weekends off in support of his suicide awareness program. I have to do this EVERY DAY. I would just like to reiterate, I can't take the weekends off, which may cause me to become uncomfortably healthy and make me lose weight and I already lose enough stuff. So I am going to have a productive October; trying new things that don't involve a lot of planning and walking every single 31 days of this terribly long month. Oooh! One thing I want to do (I realized this as I was walking up and down our road today) is to get one of those huge rubber bouncy balls with the handles and bounce down the road one whole time! Wouldn't that be great? I don't know if they even sell those anymore, but I need to find out!

Tuesday, October 1, 2013

Brothers and Peaches and Rashes, Oh My!


For the next 14 minutes, today is October 1, 2013. There have been a few new things going on in my life, some really big, some not so big. Okay, well only one really big one. I have found my brother. I grew up knowing he was out there somewhere and hoping he was happy and wondering if he was still alive but I never could find him. Then three days ago BAM! There he is on Facebook! I am still giddy about it. He said he would get to know me, so I hope he likes me (some people do, actually). Then there were two not so enormous things that happened today, but still will hopefully stay in my head as a learning experience.

The first one of those things is I found out what's in a peach! I know there's a pit, but I decided to dig even deeper. I had finished my yummy, juicy peach today and was looking at that hard thing in the middle that looks like a tiny wooden brain and really studied it. I got to know my pit. I was in tune with the pit. Then I decided to break it. There's this seam down the middle and if you bite it really hard and don't mind having a dentist yell at you later, you can crack it right open! Well I did, and there's a whole other world inside the peach pit! Instead of this gnarled ugly chunk of wood, there is this smooth wooden womb. It looks like a tiny woman must have been in there her whole life shining and dusting and smoothing that wood. It looks so pretty. I just had to touch it and it felt like those beautiful wooden bowls you see at art shows and things. Well, also, inside this silky, chocolate colored cocoon is a seed. I had always assumed the pit was the seed of a peach. Turns out there's like a seed inside the seed. It's very pretty and smooth and the color of cinnamon and looks just like a fat almond. The only difference at all is that it is softer. Even when I broke the seed apart, the inside looked like an almond. The meat was smooth and milky white and had that split through it just like an almond. Now, I know some of you will not understand this, but I thought “well, it looks like an almond on the outside and on the inside, it smells nutty, I bet it will taste like an almond too!”. So, I bit it. Oh, it was awful. You know how you have to let something settle on your tongue for a minute before your brain catches up to what's going on in your mouth? Well, by the time my brain caught on, the damage was done. I had let it sit there and get this, I don't know, bitter - maybe - taste in my mouth. Then came the burning. Oh, it hurt so bad. Actually at 11:59 it still hurts so bad. The tip of my tongue. Because, you know I had to nibble it and let a bunch of crunched up pieces sit on the tip of my tongue while my brain was on a coffee break and when it came back it realized something was burning the tongue! So it finally sent the “Spit it out” signal and I spit it out, but the tip of my tongue feels like I had left it sitting in kerosene for a while. I know that sounds weird, but it's a gas, or kerosene flavor. And my mouth hurts. So, I did not find a new source of almonds. I simply found a way to get the flavor and effect of fuel in ones mouth without having to do any of that nasty siphoning. There has to be an award for that.

Second thing I found out. Warning labels are there for a reason. Any woman reading this will know what I'm talking about when I say under-boob sweat. It's like what guys get in their armpits, only it's under where our boobs make contact with our chest. Fortunately mine hasn't reached my knees yet and we're still at chest level. But that tiny area of contact can get so hot and sweaty. Like behind your knees in a hot car in the summer kind of sweaty. So, as I was putting on my Va Va Vanilla deodorant two days ago I knew I'd be working, so I put some deodorant on my under-boobs. I've done this once or twice before and never thought about it. Well, shortly into the work day, I got a migraine. I quit and went to bed and turned off all the lights and dared anyone to speak above a whisper. Then yesterday, I still had the headache so I didn't shower because the sound of water is like a jet engine when I have a migraine. I just reached in my cabinet and put on some deodorant and thinking back to the day before (as spots swam before my eyes), I put more on my under-boobs, just as a precaution and went back to bed and later threw up. Well, today the headache is down to a level that I can force myself to take a shower, because I hadn't taken one yesterday. So guess what? When you put deodorant on where it doesn't belong for two days in a row, it will give you this searing rash all up under your boobs that consists of about a bazillion tiny blister dots and it's red and stings like you got stung. I had always seen the warning label on deodorant that said “For use on underarms only” but for the life of me I couldn't figure out why they needed that. What, was someone going to use it to get rid of the stink-eye? Were they going to walk around in it to make their feet smell better? Maybe they could brush their teeth with it? I never understood the label. What dumb ass doesn't just put deodorant under their arms? That would be me.

So, as a way to waste time, this October, I am going to challenge myself to do something new every day. It has to be something I've never done before, like get a brother or eat a peach seed, although, those don't count now. I might smash a plum with a hammer or test the no-tears theory behind baby shampoo. Who knows? I will do things around the house that I have never done before because if I go outside I am bound to get something from nature on me and the nature in mountains is usually big, so I've ruled that out. I probably won't go anywhere because home is where my Diet Cokes are and I really have to see what I can do about this rash.
Wish me luck!