Taking Batsh*t Crazy to a Whole 'Nother Level.

Last night I had to show CJ how to floss properly (because we went to the dentist and we all have to do EVERYTHING the dentist says. Maybe we can have the dentist tell the kids to pick up their toys when they're done playing with them?), so I was standing in the bathroom downstairs and I thought I saw something fly down out of the corner of my eye. Because I'm becoming an expert on the flight pattern of bats, I was fairly certain that we had another visitor. But I turned around to look and it was gone, so I figured I was imagining things.

I explained to CJ what I had thought I'd seen and he just kind of laughed at me. Then he went upstairs and told CB that "Mommy thought she saw a bat!" CB was not amused and thought that I was off my rocker. Going batsh*t crazy, as it were. I know this because I heard him up there telling CJ that there was no way I had seen a bat. Then I went upstairs to tuck the kids in and CB went down to the basement to put a load of clothes in the wash. The next thing I heard was him pounding up the stairs, grumbling the whole way. I was only able to understand a few words, one of which was "bat".

"Ha ha! I was right! There was a bat! And I'm NOT losing my mind!" And then "Crap. There's another bat in this freaking house."

This time, however, I'm happy to report that he disappeared before we could get him back outside. And we think we've got it figured out where they are coming in. There's another door outside our house that goes straight down into the basement instead of having to go through the house and down the creaky old semi-spiraled staircase. Right above that door is a tiny little gap (we've learned through all of this that bats only need a 1/4" space to crawl through, and that boggles my mind, people!) and the steps are littered with guano. Ewwww.

So we put the plywood sheet that goes up in the winter on the door a few months early, hoping that it will at least keep the little things out of my living room.

I am so ready to move. I hated this house before, but having these things in it has been the last straw. The thing is that there are already 40 houses for sale in this town. This is not that big of a place and there isn't a huge influx of people, mostly because there is nothing here. So, odds of us actually selling and getting the hell out of here are slim to none. Plus, there's at least five remodeling projects in various states of incompletion and at least a year of work (two at the rate we've been going lately). And you have to have money to buy the stuff before you can actually finish the projects, and as you can see from yesterday's post, any spare money is being tied up in the betterment of the family's teeth.

I'm at my wit's end with all this crap. So maybe that's why I've been thinking about the past recently. About a time when I had zero responsibility and could just up and fix things whenever I wanted to. When I can't change things I want to change, it tends to push me into a funk. I'm tired of the funk.

Adventures in Dentistry & Other Fun

Since school starts two weeks from today (watch me do cartwheels and dance around the house for joy!), it's the time of year where we have to get all the checkups and such done for the kiddies. Normally it isn't a big deal because we've got health insurance, but we've been bad and slacking on the dentist visits. Neither CB nor I work at a company that provides Dental insurance, so we just haven't taken the time to get to the dentist. Plus, it's an expense that I HATE with a fiery passion. Even when we had dental, I went one time. But, I don't want to inflict my hatred of all things dentist-related onto the kids, so I scheduled them checkups. CB has had some mouth pain lately too, so the three of them had appointments this morning.

An hour and a half later, we walked out of there with an $1,800 bill. Then I died.

I'm certain that daggers shot out of my eyes because it is so insane how much it costs to have someone look at your teeth. Even if CB wouldn't have had TEN CAVITIES (!), it would have cost at least $250. That's crazy for an hour and a half of work! CB joked that he's going to just tell the dentist to rip all his teeth out & he'll make himself a set of titanium dentures. Yeah, because that's hella sexy, hon.

CJ only had one cavity, and although Diva was cavity-free, she's got an underbite. Which means that five years down the line we'll be paying for the dentist's vacation home by getting her braces. Gah!

**********
Now, onto the actual fun part. Last week, CB got a phone call from his dad (we'll call him Country Dad). CD was sharing with CB that he'd just bought a new(ish) boat. If the conversation had ended there, I would have had to listen to CB whine for the next month about how his dad gets to have all the fun and it sucks because we have this KIDS that are so friggin' expensive, blah, blah, blah. Then I would have shot him because I am so sick of the damn whining in this house and I would have been writing this entry from jail.

But CD couldn't get anything for a trade in on his old boat, and he GAVE it to CB. Just gave it to him for free. So now we have this pretty nice boat--considering that it's twenty-some years old and a fishing boat. But it goes fast enough to tube behind and is in excellent condition.

Needless to say Saturday and Sunday were spent at the lake. I took advantage of it on Saturday and went shopping. Although it wasn't much fun because the kids were whiney (see? I'm sick of the whine! I need WINE to make the whine not so damn annoying) and crabby, which makes me crabby. But I got some pretty good deals and they are now more than set for school clothes.

Sunday it was beautiful out, so I went out on the lake too. And for a few hours, I actually enjoyed the beauty of this state. It's the land of 10,000 lakes, and a vast majority of the really nice ones are located within an hour of us. The one we were at on Sunday is big, but it's pretty quiet. The sky was a perfect bright blue with big puffy clouds and the water was cool and not disgusting (which is a feat in and of itself by this point in the summer). I sat in the boat, the little waves rocking us back and forth and realized this is an OK life. If every weekend could be like that, I could handle living in this small town of big mouths. And then the kids started getting bored. I seriously considered jumping in the water and swimming away. But I didn't. And we all came home, relaxed and drained from the sun. I slept like a rock for the first time in a long time. That, my friends, is what I call a perfect way to end a weekend.

Heavy

Confusious wonder:

Why do I have this death grip on the past when all I really want to do is let go?

Go See My Renter

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I am in love with MySpace. . .

. . .And maybe just a tish obsessed.

But I was scared of it for a long time. The only things I'd heard about it was the bad. Like the super-stalkers out for blood. But my brother had told me about it, so I decided to check it out.

Now I've spent the past two weeks catching up with classmates that I haven't seen since graduation. Some even from California that I haven't seen since I was 12! It's AWESOME!

So, MySpace, I'm sorry. I'm sorry that I let all the negative press get to me. And I'm sorry that I never gave you a chance when I first heard about you.

I also got a bit of exciting news last night--I'm going to be a ballarina. Or a tap-dancer. Or something like that! I had been wishing that the girl who teaches dance in town would do an adult class, and last night one of my friends told me that she is! Starting in September! I'm soooo excited! I used to take ballet when I was little, but it interfered with my "Muppet Babies" watching, so after a year (and a jump to the advanced class), I dropped out. And I've hated myself for it for years. Hopefully it's like riding a bike & it will all come back to me right away. Or you'll be seeing my uncooridnated ass on America's Funniest Home Videos as I careene off the stage.

I Think a Change Would Do Me Good

So I didn’t get the coaching job. Which is totally OK. It wasn’t like we actually NEEDED the money. And a friend of mine that is a single mom got the job, so I’m totally fine with it.

It was probably a good thing anyway. I’ve never really tried for something that I didn’t think I would get. Which is probably cocky, I know. But it’s not really like that. I applied at the college that our high school used for our free college classes, at which I was already a student anyway. I’ve always applied for jobs that I knew I would get just because I knew no one else would apply. So this was the first time that I actually took a stab at something that I didn’t KNOW was a sure thing. I’m glad I did, because it doesn’t hurt nearly as bad as I thought it would.

And I had started posting this yesterday, but I got interrupted by a VERY gorgeous man knocking on my door. Seriously, it was insane! He was dressed all nice with a black polo & khakis and some bad ass sunglasses. Clean cut with dark brown eyes and a slight tan. GOR-GEOUS. He had a slight southern drawl to his voice and I could have just listened to him say my name all damn day. Oy. Sometimes life just ain’t fair!

He was a salesman for some carpet-cleaner thingy but I was NOT paying attention. Unfortunately I don’t have any carpet worth cleaning because it’s all getting ripped out, but he did say that her would come back if he had the attachment for cleaning hard wood floors with him. And I’m not going to lie and say that I didn’t spend the rest of the day with a super-tuned ear to the door. . .

He didn’t come back, and that was probably OK too. But I was sure glad that I had decided to put on makeup yesterday morning!

Today I went to get my hair cut. I’ve never found someone to be *my* hairstylist, so I just usually go to the same place and hope one day there will be someone there that will know just what haircut would be perfect for me and just do it. And today was not that day. Today I had a guy cut my hair for the first time. And he was nice enough, but you could just tell he’s more of a “barbershop” kind of guy than a “hair salon” kind of guy. Plus he was HUGE. He was sweating profusely the whole time he was cutting my hair. Ugh. And the hair is OK. But I just wish that I could find THAT person. The person who is a miracle worker and could tame my slightly-wavy-but-not-wavy-enough-to-be-cute hair into a fantastic style that is both chic and only takes five minutes to style.

And now I’m sitting here with some blonde in a bottle, contemplating if I really want to go back that route. Luckily it’s a kind that washes out in like 6 weeks, so if I hate it, I don’t have to live with it long.

Can you tell it’s time for something to change in my life? This is the way it goes. I get the “everything is too similar” feeling and things have to start changing. When I wasn’t living in this house, that was solved by me changing around the living room furniture. But this house only has one way that the living room can be. Diva doesn’t want her room changed around & CJ has way too much crap in his to try and change it around. Our room can only be one way too. But I’m going to beg on CB just a little bit to see if we can repaint in there. Maybe that will make me feel better.

So I’m off to stare at the hair dye some more & try and get my kids to JUST. STOP. FIGHTING. FOR THE LOVE OF GOD!!!!!!!!!!!

Redneck Fun at the County Fair

Whenever I talk about going to the county fair, I feel like busting out my best Larry the Cable Guy impersonation. But I suppose it’s really not a Redneck thing. I used to go to the Del Mar County Fair every year when I was little. I remember going through each exhibition hall, gawking at all the old Barbies and cereal boxes and Happy Meal toys. And I remember in the industry hall there was a water company that was set up every year with a spigot that looked to be floating above the crowd, pouring water into a bucket beneath it. I’m too embarrassed to tell you how old I was before I finally figured it out. But I will say it was after I had moved out of the state.

My other favorite thing there was getting to meet the girls who were county royalty. And the Fairest of the Fair. There was a Spanish theme to the fairgrounds, so the Fairest of the Fair would usually be dressed in one of those pretty Spanish dresses that the girls hold in their hand to dance (I have no idea what they are called, I just know that it was all I wanted to wear when I was little) and a mantilla in their hair. They were GORGEOUS. And I wanted to be them when I grew up. But then I learned all the stuff you have to do at an actual beauty pageant and decided it didn’t sound like such a cool thing anymore.

The fair we went to on Saturday was about one tenth the size of the Del Mar fair, with probably twice as many stinky animals. OK, so probably not, but I never had to wander through every single animal stall before I married a man that wants to be a farmer when he grows up. And had two kids that love talking to the animals. Diva likes to pretend that she can speak their language, so we had her stopping at every stall telling that particular animal that they were the cutest one there. It’s cute and I love it, but I never thought that I would.

After wandering through the animal houses and going on a couple of way-too-expensive-for what-they-are rides, we embraced our true Redneckdom at the Demo Derby.

Now, up until about three years ago, the Demos got an emphatic “no” from me every time the hubs asked if I wanted to go. But since I gave birth to his own Mini-Me, CB roped CJ into asking if we could “please, please, please” go to the Demo Derby. And that kid is so cute that it’s impossible to say no to him. So I went along, and the rest—as they say—is history. It was so fun! More fun than I thought it would be. It made me want to find an old Chevette and paint it pink to go play too. But I haven’t. After Saturday’s race, I’m glad. We got in early enough that we got pretty good seats and I saw a whole lot of bouncing around inside those cars when they would get hit. It just looks painful.

Another bonus of the good seats was the occasional overspray of mud balls. There’s a big fence that is supposed to catch the majority of them, but my hair was caked with mud. Plus, it started to rain in the middle of the derby (the stands are covered—thankfully), so by the end of the night, it wasn’t so much mud “balls” as muddy water being splashed up from the track. The kids were laughing so hard that I couldn’t help but laugh too. But I treated myself to a deep conditioning treatment when we got home because there was no other way that crap was coming out of my hair.

The ride home was terrible! It was raining so hard in a couple of places that we had to slow down to about 35 on the highway. The wipers couldn’t even keep up! And in the middle of the night there was a huge crack of thunder that practically made me jump right out of bed.

CB had wanted to go to a threshing show yesterday, but sadly it was still raining (I wish I knew a way to project the sarcasm in that statement), so we stayed home and went swimming at the community center instead.

So all in all it was a pretty good weekend. A good way to keep my mind off of things. And thanks to everyone that commented on Friday! I hope you all got to have some great conversations with old friends! :)

How was your weekend?

Glamorous New Holiday--Ten years of remembering

When I was four years old, my parents moved to an apartment complex where my mom became the manager. I was sad because it was something new and I was leaving my friends. Granted, it was only a move across the street, but that’s just the same as across the country when you can’t cross the street without a grown up.

Anyway, I was out playing by myself one day when a chubby little girl with long brown hair and big brown eyes was shooed out the door by her dad. I suspect he’d seen me out there playing and was encouraging her to come and say hello.

She did, finally, and that was all it took. We were instant friends. And we did everything together from that point on. We were there for each other through both of our parents’ divorces and she was there to encourage me when my mom married my step dad.

But, with the new step dad came a move to another town. After spending the past eight years across the grass from my very best friend, it was unfathomable to imagine being a half an hour away from each other. It was hard, but we made the best of it. We called all the time and had sleepovers what seemed like almost monthly.

Then the big bomb dropped. My parents told me that we really were moving across country—to Virginia—and my whole world collapsed. It didn’t help that I was 13 at the time and my whole world consisted of friends and nothing but. I was furious. Did they plan on flying me back on a regular basis so I could see Heather? Or did they plan on paying for her to come and see me? The answer was—of course—no, but that they would try their best to get us together.

That was the worst transition period of my life! We wrote each other letters at least weekly, saying nothing at all, really. I cried all the time and I hated my parents. Typical, right?

But, once school started and new friends became pretty simple to meet, the letters came less and less often. She became active in student government, I became active in lying to my parents and hanging out with the wrong kind of people. We still wrote letters—but it became more like every month or so, turning less frequent as the year went on—and talked on the phone quite a bit. We started to move on with our lives, and being separated started to not hurt so bad.

After two years of living in Virginia, my parents told me that we were moving again—this time to Podunk, MN. I wasn’t as sad this time. Life had started spiraling out of control in front of me—I had gone from being a straight A student to passing 9^th grade with a D average—and I was ready for the change. Plus, we were closer to California! It might be more conceivable to make a trip that direction! Heather and I were excited again, and when I first got here, the letters and phone calls picked right back up again. But, in the same pattern, as soon as school started, the letters diminished to hardly at all, and phone calls came about once every other month or so.

I can’t remember the last time I talked to her—it was somewhere around her birthday—August 4^th—and we spoke for quite some time. The thing that I loved about her was that she was one of those friends that you COULD go for months without talking to, then pick up the phone and call and it would be like you had just spoken yesterday.

Then the phone call came that changed my life forever. At 11:32 pm on August 11, 1996 the phone rang. No one calls that late, so I knew something was wrong. I heard my mom answer the phone, and I went downstairs to find out what had happened. She was on the phone, and I just KNEW by the look on her face that someone had died.

“What, Mom? What is it?” I was frantic.

“Heather died in a car accident.” It was such a such a simple phrase, but it left me numb. I collapsed to the ground “No, no, no, no, no” echoed through my head. This wasn’t supposed to happen to people like her. People who were bound for greatness, who were funny enough to be on a good season of SNL. People who were smart enough to take on the world and win were not supposed to die in car accidents. That was a fate reserved for people like me that snuck alcohol out of their parents’ stash and only dated boys that smoked (smoking pot was an added bonus). It should have been me. I was always supposed to die before her. We had discussed this. I was older by 7 months, therefore *I* would die first. It wasn’t fair and I was pissed.

The next few days were a blur. Mom tried to help, but there was no money to go to the funeral. I had to sit here and wait for calls from my friends to get the run down. I spoke on the phone to her mom—who was like a second mom to me—and it was like talking to a robot. She was a wreck. I didn’t know how we would all make our way through this. But a conversation with one of my friend’s dad—who also was my pastor—helped a lot. I did a lot of writing. Things I wish that I had said. Good memories (like going to see La Traviata together). Bad memories (the time that she stopped talking to me for three days because I got her with a squirt gun). And everything in between. Writing had always been my escape, but it became the best form of therapy.

I still dealt with a lot of “I should have been there. I should have been the one driving. I wouldn’t have let this happen.” But you can make yourself crazy with the “what ifs”.

After graduation, I did finally get out there. I went to the library in Escondido, CA and searched the microfiche for newspaper articles. We drove past her old apartment. I did a lot of crying, but it felt good. Not everyone is blessed with such a good friend—even if it was for a short time.

Today makes it ten years since that day. I feel like I should be doing something. But I don’t know what. Life still goes on, and I still have to be at work. If I had my way, I would have flown out to California and gone to the place where it happened. I would have sobbed and prayed and sobbed some more.

But instead, I spend the day remembering my best friend. The girl who was there for me through more crap than anyone should be. The girl who loved me no matter what. And the girl who was going to be my roommate when we moved to New York City to pursue greatness.

And I ask you to help remember her too. I hereby declare August 11th Glamorous Redneck's International Best Friend day. Call your best friend—even if you can’t get together—and tell him/her how much you care about them. Because you never know when it’s going to be the last time you talk to them. Wanna participate? It isn't anything spectacular. Just let me know and post a link back in your blog. I want this to be HUGE! :)

Edit:Kat just made this cute graphic for me. Go ahead and use it if you want to! Thanks, KAT! :)

In memory of Heather Lynn Hanson, August 4, 1980-August 11, 1996

I love you and I miss you.

100 Things About Me # 43 B

As promised, the second half of the couch story:

The purple couch sat in my parents’ garage for quite some time. Then my dad threatened to throw it away if I didn’t find a home for it. Well, we couldn’t have that, could we?

I happened to have a LOT of free time my senior year. One of the cool things at our school is that when you are a Junior or Senior, you can take college classes for free at the high school. And I did it, for the sole reason that college semesters ended earlier than ours did, so anyone who took college classes would end up with an extra study hall for the last two weeks of each semester. And if you got finished with all the work before that, you would get even longer. So I took two college classes, which happened to fall in the two periods right after lunch, with a study hall after that. Since the second one was a writing class, I breezed through it in a hurry & ended up with a month of free time.

Two friends of mine were in the same class, and got done around the same time I did. And we did a lot of plotting during that study hall. When I mentioned the purple couch to them, they both decided that it needed to come into the senior hallway. Since the only seating we had out there was benches made out of leftover pieces of wood, I thought the couch would be perfect. One of my friends had a pickup, so we took off over to my house and loaded the couch up.

We were very incognito about the whole thing. The truck pulled into a little alcove that no one used and we hauled the couch into the senior hallway. It was a good thing they were guys, because it made all the work go a LOT faster. Plus, I had insisted to them that we wouldn’t be able to do it by ourselves, which only made them want to do it that much more.

After we got the couch situated (against a wall, because of the whole “reclining” feature) where we wanted it, the three of us sat down. Our principal came through and rolled his eyes at us, promising that the couch would stay.

Right at that time, the bell rang to signify the end of that period. And we were bombarded! I think half the senior class piled on top of us! Someone took a picture with my camera, but it was a crappy one, so it didn’t turn out. I was super bummed!

Then after school, the seniors (it’s a small school, only about 120 in my graduating class & that was BIG) signed the couch in varying colors of permanent ink. We got several more confirmations from teachers and other staff people that the couch would stay, but when we got to school the next morning, it was gone. And we were irate! Several of us spent the next few days searching every corner of the school, but to no avail. Our couch was lost.

But Snow week we heard a rumor that the couch had been found. No one had seen it yet, but the rumor was that it was going to make an appearance at the pep rally that Friday. We all waited very patiently for the time to come.

And when it did, we weren’t disappointed! We walked into the gym and saw a couch that was covered in a blanket. Those of us who had seen the couch the first time around knew exactly what it was. And even some of the underclassmen who had been walking through the hallway or heard the story were busy whispering.

The couch finally made its rebut at the beginning of the pep rally. Everyone erupted into cheers as the blanket was ripped away, revealing our purple couch! The Snowball King and Queen candidates did a version of Singled Out and the winners all sat on the couch until the end of the pep rally.

After it was over, we begged and pleaded for the couch to be back in the Senior hallway, but we were shot down. A classmate took it home, and last I heard, it was their couch in their fish house. I don’t know if it still is today, but even if it’s not, that purple vinyl couch will go down as one of the coolest things ever to grace our little Podunk High School.

Oh Back to School. . .back to school. . .

The brother is all officially moved in. Or something. His dorm is really cool--especially since once school starts it will be a single room.

He’s going to a small college about two hours from here, and the lucky rat gets to be in the only dorm with air conditioning.

Actually, he was lucky last year too. His dorm was right next to the food service and on the main floor.

This year, he’s not on the main floor. He’s on the third floor. Even there is air conditioning, they conveniently neglected to add elevators. And he packed all his stuff into super heavy bags that were taller than me.

Add to that the fact that it was so humid yesterday that there was a haze in the air, and the ride home in the car was not pleasant. I was just glad the brother wasn’t along for that! The temperature was only like 75, so it could have been a perfect day. But it had to be 100% humidity because it felt way hotter than it was.

We made it back to town just in time for me to go to practice for singing at church, so I rushed in the house all quick like, kissed the hubs and was back out the door again.

Then I came home and took a shower and died.

Today I am still tired, although I’m surprisingly not sore. And I have three extra girls coming over to my house for a while today. Think I can convince all of them that we need naps?

Holy Crap

I just got smacked at I Talk 2 Much. And it didn't hurt too bad.

I can't tell you how scared I was. I mean, I thought it would be fun because those girls and guys are hilarious. And I was prepared to be ripped a new one. But, I wasn't. And Merciless Minx LIKED it here. I'm speechless. Really. Only suggestion was to make the content boxes a different color, which I'm off to go figure out right now.

New Roommate

I've been really bad at promoting my renters for the past couple of weeks, but I've got a new one today and am going to try to be a much better landlord this week!

So go visit Crayons, Playdoh and Wax. Oh My! :)

She's a stay at home mom who lives in the beautiful state of Colorado. So go on, go say hi. And make sure that you tell her I sent you!

We all slept much better last night. When I got home from work, CB was furthering our Redneck Advancement by putting duct tape along the sides of CJ's room. Now, please note that this is not a permanent decor. We just all had the heebie jeebies from the bat and wanted to ensure no more repeats. And, since we live in Podunk, you can't just run to the store and buy quarter round to put on the walls. So we have to wait until Saturday when we go to semi-Civ and buy some. But it does match nicely with the duct tape in the hallway where CB knocked a giant hole in the wall. I'm all about tying rooms together. And I hate this house with every fiber of my being!

Today the kids and I are going with my mom and Bro to move him back to college. He gets to play football, so I think he's actually excited to be going back this time around. It's hard to believe that the little (all six feet of him) brother is getting ready to start his second year of college. When I was going into my second year, I was a mom to a two week old baby and in the process of planning a wedding. Thank goodness he is no where near ready for that sort of stuff. That boy still has LOTS of growing up to do.

Bats in My Belfry

So last night at about 2:30 in the morning, Diva woke up crying because she’d had a bad dream. I went in her room and she told me that she had dreamt that a butterfly was flying around her room and she woke up and it was real. I tried to calm her down, but then she pointed up to the ceiling, “See, there it is again!” and I just about died.

It most certainly wasn’t a butterfly. And it took the thing flying through a couple of times for me to realize what it was. There was a bat flying around our house!

First I had Diva tell me when it had flown back out of her room, then I realized there were still two other rooms the thing could fly through and it needed to be OUT of my house.

So I opened the door again and immediately dropped down to the floor, all commando style and crawled back into my bedroom.

“Umm, CB?”

Half-mumble, “Yeah?”

“I think there’s a bat in the house.” I was amazed at my calmness.

“So?”

“So, will you take care of it, please?”

“I’m not dealing with it tonight.”

At this point every curse word known to man ran through my head. “Please? There is no way that I will be able to sleep knowing that thing is flying around. Besides, I think its landed over there.”

He mumbles a few more inaudible words (surely cursing me the way I had been cursing him) and gets up. I took Diva in my room and got back on my bed. Then the bat started flying in our room too. I screamed like a little girl every time it did its little swooping circle thing. And I stayed under the blanket until he told me that he’d smacked it and thought it was dead.

Then I woke CJ up too and told him what was going on. And I had the kids bring their sleeping bags in our room so we could close the door.

CB went downstairs to get something to get the bat with and I swallowed down my shrieks so I could stand watch and make sure the dumb thing didn’t fly away again.

He came back with gloves on and a bag to put it in. And our Swiffer with the extendable handle. He used that to push the bat out from underneath the radiator.

The damn thing was still alive! It started squeaking this horrid squeak and I was back under the covers in no time. But CB had it held down with the Swiffer and was laughing because it kept trying to bite it. Yes. Really funny, dear.

He finally got the thing in a bag, so he took it outside and beat it profusely with a two by four.

Everyone was wide awake for quite some time, giggling and talking now that the bat was safely out of our house.

I’m tired as hell and am just hoping to make it through today without falling asleep.

Edited to add: A little disclaimer. I don't often think before I speak. Which means that I often don't think before I post either. It didn't dawn on my that not everyone would just automatically know that we don't usually go off a-killin' around here. In fact the last three (yes three. Did I mention that I hate this house?) times we've dealt with a bat in here, we've let it go on about it's merry way. Because like Cat said, they eat mosquitoes. Lots of them. And since people in this state call the mosquitoe our "unofficial state bird", the Good Lord knows there are a plethora of those little bloodsuckers around. I just think that CB was frustrated and tired and he took it out on the bat. Plus, they have rabies and are scary and I do NOT want them in my house. So the duct tape should save anymore bats from meeting the same fate. I'm sorry if it offended anyone, but that's the way it goes sometimes.

The Ballad of Ricky Bobby & Other Random Randomness

Was fantastic! Two of the funny one-liners that I can remember (I was sitting in the theater wishing I would have had a notepad to write down all the good ones):

Ricky Bobby: "I get up every morning and piss excellence!"

Frenchie: (after he doesn't let Ricky Bobby pass and Ricky crashes) "Hakuna Matata, Bitches!"

There were a thousand others, and if you like Will Ferrell's comedy, you will LOVE this movie!

There was a guy behind us though that evidently didn't like it as well because he fell asleep and he was SNORING! How the hell do you fall asleep in a movie theater full of people laughing their asses off?

We also watched SNL: The Best of Cheri Oteri, which we purchased last night. I had forgotten all the funny characters that she had on there. I always remember the Spartans because I love them and am trying to convince CB that we need to be them for Halloween this year. I couldn't finish it, though, because I am an old fuddy-duddy and was too tired. But! I made it til almost 11:30! Yahoo for me!

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Then last night I had a dream about The Ex. You know the one, the one you broke up with years and years ago, but you were CERTAIN he or she was The One? I hate when I dream about him because he was an asshole then. Of course now he's an uber hottie and he's a Marine*. And I know it was never love. But it was some damn good lust. And now that I've dreamt about him, I'll spend the next two days wondering "what if". But there is not what if. We're both happily married and are still pretty good friends, so there's no reason to doubt that things ended up exactly the way they were supposed to.

*This is another reason why it would never have worked. He has always dreamt of being a Marine and I have had strict qualifications that I would never marry a Cop, Firefighter, or Military man. It's bad enough to have a Brother in Law over there right now, I can't imagine having your husband go to a foreign place with no guarantee that he'll come back. I have enough drama in my life, I'm not about to willingly choose more!

Defying Gravity

I feel extremely un-entertaining today, but I finally found a recording of my favorite Wicked song that you can actually see. And it gave me the (almost) the same feeling that I had when I watched it at the theater. Goosebumps and breathless. So take a look and tell me what you think!

The Day That Will Drag On Forevah

I'm tired.

I'm tired and I don't want to be here today.

I'm tired, I don't want to be here today, and the day will not end.

That is, of course, because today is Child Free Day! As soon as I get outta here, I just have to stop at home, get re-prettified, and take the kids to my mom's apartment. Which means I'm excited. And when I'm excited, the day goes on and on and on.

CB and I are going to Talledega Nights tonight. Then we will be home by 10 and in bed (sleeping) because we are old and tired and a couple of fuddy-duddies.

Then tomorrow is shopping day! For the sole purpose of eating at Space Aliens. Now, if you don't live near one of these, you are missing out! The food is fantastic and the kids are thoroughly entertained for the entire time. Plus, there's a game room so horray for bribery! After we eat there, we'll probably jump over to the outlet malls because the incredibly shrinking me needs new clothes!

I never thought THAT would happen. After I had the kids, I ballooned up and I figured I would just stay there. Because even though my mom is tall and skinny, both of my grandmas were short and not so skinny. A fine quality in a grandma, but in a 26 year old who still insists she can shop in the "cool" stores? Not so much. So I started a workout routine that I stuck to during the school year. And I will probably go back to it once school starts again. I've dropped two whole sizes since February and I keep going! Can we say woo-freaking-hoo?!

But now, I must go back to the boring-ness of work. And try and find something to make the day go faster. Because I am DYING!

Edited to add: I just got a phone call from daycare. Diva isn't feeling well. So if she doesn't perk up tonight, the whole thing may just get shot to hell. And my head might explode. Stay tuned, y'all.

Things that annoy me.

This isn't a Thursday Thirteen, per se. Mostly because I don't think there will be thirteen things on the list. I'm a pretty easy going person. It takes a lot to aggrivate me. But the things on this list are things that make me want to take someone's head off. And they are probably stupid things to you, but I think we've already established that I'm strange. So here they are, in no particular order:



- Ads that are embedded into websites. You know the ones that I'm talking about. They appear as soon as you get to a webpage. They're usually advertising a movie or Oreo cookies or something like that. And they usually have sound that starts screaming at you. Wanna close it? Good luck finding the teeeeny tiny little "x" that is either all the way at the top or all the way at the bottom of the page. Grah!

- People who do not use their cruise control. This doesn't apply for all you big city-type folks. But I live in PO-DUNK. A traffic jam is five cars waiting at the stop light. Yes I said THE stoplight. There's only one between here and semi-civilization. Why would you not use your cruise control? Because it makes too much sense. It's much more fun to alternate between 45 and 75 MPH on the highway.

- Bad endings. I've discussed this before. I hate when a movie or book ends bad. Mostly because I read or watch a movie to be entertained. And when they end bad, I usually spend the next few hours overanalyzing and re-writing until the ending suits my Happily Ever After criteria. Pathetic, yes, but if people would just write good books and make good movies all the time, I wouldn't have this problem! :)

- People who don't control their children in public. Being a parent is hard, I know. But when your child bites another child and makes them bleed? And you don't do a damn thing about it other than laugh? That pisses me off. How can people who are trying to teach their kids how to play with others explain those types of things? Add also the people who just let their kids run rampant and expect other people to parent them. Sorry, but that's YOUR job. Yeah, maybe you didn't sign up for it, but it's a lifetime gig, so start acting like it!

- People who stop in the middle of an isle/mall/street/etc. Again, living in Podunk, I deal with this a lot. I'm all for stopping and saying "hi" when you run across someone you know, but DO NOT just stop in the middle of the road and expect people to maneuver around you! This is especially annoying when the senior citizen types do it in the grocery store. "Oh, Edith, I haven't seen you since yesterday! Tell me your whole life story. Right now. Don't worry about those other people. They don't have LIVES or anything that they need to get to." OK, so I've never heard that exact conversation. But sometimes that's how it feels. Really, is it that hard to pull your cart over and out of the way so that other people can get past?

And people who speed along in the mall, only to stop dead in their tracks at the sight of something they like. Granted, I've been guilty of this a few times. But that's usually when there's a big sign outside of Bath & Body Works or Old Navy that says "SALE!" or "Gift With Purchase!" or "Carrie! Come and make yourself bankrupt right here! Because it's so pretty!"

This only became annoying to me when I started trying to push a stroller through the Mall of America. Those strollers don't just stop at a moment's notice. And then it's MY fault that I ran into you. Please!

So I guess that's it for now. I'm sure I'll think of more as the day progresses. And who knows, round here I could always find a whole new one to add to the list!

100 Things About Me # 43 A

I glanced at my 100 things list yesterday, and it occurred to me that some of them maybe require a little more explanation than a list would allow. So (partially on a cue from Liberal Banana), I’ve decided to explain some of them further. In no particular order. But the one I’ve picked today is I think the funniest story of them all. And it gives a little more insight into my Redneck upbringing.

There was a pretty nasty flood here in 1997. Bad enough that we made national news (though not quite as bad as what’s going on by Jessica), and the worst of it hit our downtown. Which meant that a lot of the businesses had water in their basements. Which also meant that there was a whole bunch of furniture that ended up getting thrown away.

One night, a friend and I were taking our dogs on a walk when we spotted something purple in one of the big dumpsters downtown. We wondered what it was, and I decided to climb up the side to get a better look. Lo and behold it was a couch! Not just any couch, but a purple vinyl couch! It looked like it was in pretty good shape. And we joked about coming back and pulling it out to be used somewhere.

But as we continued on our walk, we became more serious about getting the couch. We started hatching a plan and rounded up a couple more of our friends (we tried to get it with just the two of us, but it was way too heavy). After one of them got off work, she came out to the car with her hoodie pulled over her head & singing the Mission Impossible theme. We drove back to the dumpster (this is about 9:30 at night now), and MI girl and I jumped in the dumpster to hand the couch back out to the other two chickens. . .err. . .friends.

It was insanely heavy! But we finally pushed it out of the dumpster. “Now what?”

“It’ll fit in my trunk.” So sayeth friend #1. We all laughed. Because even though it was a Buick LeSabre, it was NOT going to fit a six foot couch into the trunk. But she was insistent. So we tried it. Forwards and backwards and leftways and rightways it would. Not. Fit.

“Now what?” I asked again, after catching my breath from laughing so hard.

“We’ll put it on top of the car.” Friend #1 reasoned.

So we hiked this insanely heavy couch up over our heads and onto the top of the car. Which happened to be her mom’s. And I’m sure we put more than a few scratches on the roof. We didn’t have any rope or anything to tie it down, so we ended up all sticking one hand out the window to hold onto the dumb thing. By this time it was close to 10:00, and it was in the spring time, which meant that it still was really cold at night. And our hands would have been cold enough just holding onto the thing for the four blocks back to my house. But Friend #1 (she is my best friend and is freaking hilarious) decided that we needed to take back alleys and side streets. And drive on the side streets at about 50 MPH. My hands felt like they were going to fall off. I say hands because it was so cold I had to keep alternating which one was out the window.

We finally made it to my house and decided to put the couch in my parents’ garage. So we got it off the car and set it up. It was a perfectly good couch. It wasn’t wet or moldy or anything gross, so we couldn’t understand why they had thrown it away.

Until I sat on it and fell backwards. The back was cracked right along the line with the seat. Free recliner! We all laughed, but it stayed in the garage for quite sometime.

Tune in next week for the story of sneaking the purple couch into my school!

Sweet Relief!

Yesterday it was 100 degrees (F) out. That's HOLY-HELL-ON-EARTH in Celcius. That was just the temperature. Add to it the 70% humidity and we had a heat index of 118! And it was the fourth day in a row of that crap. The kids were going stir-crazy what with the no outside-ness and the don't touch mommy because it's to flipping hot to have anymore skin touching my body.

But! Last night! It rained! And choirs of angels sang down and said "Here! Sweet Relief!"

And I replied with "'Bout damn time, thanks much!"

So it's much nicer outside today, but the chilluns still cannot play because of all the rain. It does seem, however, that everyone's attitudes have changed once the temperature got back down below boiling. Or maybe it was just my attitude that needed to change because I wanted to kill anyone that came within ten feet of me. Nah. I'm sure EVERYONE had bad attitudes.

It's hard to believe that it's already August 1st. In just 25 days I will be the mom of a 7 year old. This does not seem possible for the girl who refuses to grow up. But I will be appropriately torturing him starting today by making him read for a half hour every day. I think I mentioned this before, but the hubs is on the bandwagon now. So that means that it will all happen. Because I am insanely lax when it comes to ritual-type thingies. That's why I don't have a workout routine. And also why I do really well at things for the first couple days, but then it's all down hill. But the hubs is a perfectionist extraordinarre. He will ensure that all of us spend our time reading.

So, since I didn't go get my book on Friday (too damn hot out!), we are making a trip to the little town that's 12 miles away, but has stores! With books! for me to pick up Wicked today. Because the Good Lord knows that I will not be spending a half hour of reading anything that's--like--enlightening or something.

We'll also be showcasing our extreme nerdery by watching day three of Shark Week on the Discovery channel. Yes, it's the highlight of our week and no, we do not have a life.

But! I get to be child-free on Friday night so CB and I can go see Talledega Nights! I'm so very excited! Not only for the hilarity that will surely ensue, but also for No Kids! At my house! For a whole night! Which means no sleep interruptions by people who sneeze and talk and snore and do all sorts of weird things in their sleep!

So you see, sweet relief abounds beyond all measure!

Why Glamorous Redneck?

I’m renting a spot from Willow this week and she reviewed my blog! And while it was a pretty good review, she posed a question that I probably haven’t addressed on here. And I’ve been asked it at least once before. She wondered how I can be a redneck in Minnesota and how the cowboy stuff all comes into play. So I thought it would be a good idea to explain myself.

Glamorous-(I like this dictionary definition best of all) adj : having an air of allure, romance and excitement; "glamorous movie stars". I’d like to hope I have that. I know that my friends would vouch for an outing with me as being “exciting”. But I guess I picked this because I love all things pretty and sparkly. I love people like Marilyn Monroe and Bette Paige and pretty much any other model and/or actress from the 30’s and 40’s. Back when you could look up to movie stars (for the most part). They weren’t toothpicks and they didn’t whine about how their lives are sooooo rough.

I like the idea of getting dressed up and going to the theater. In fact, I thrive on it. Everyone can tell when I haven’t gone for a while because I get a little cranky. I need those types of atmospheres to feel human.

If I could, I would have a penthouse apartment either in Minneapolis or (my dream) NYC. But I would also be independently wealthy and have things like maids and stylists and all sorts of fun things like that.

Redneck-(I’m only taking the first definition because the second is horrible and has nothing to do with me) n. Used as a disparaging term for a member of the white rural laboring class, especially in the southern United States. OK, so I don’t live in the south. But I live in a small town. A place where things like tractor pulls and mud races are the highlight of everyone’s summer. And a place where the top story in the (weekly) newspaper is that the corn is drying up.

I guess I think of “redneck” as small town. Not just any small town, though. Because if I lived in a quaint little town in Connecticut or something, I would NOT be thinking Redneck. Then I would just be “Glamorous Glamorous” because that would be close to New York and. . .oh I can’t even think about it.

As for the cowboy stuff, I’m married to a cowboy. And as I described in this post, this area is actually pretty heavily stocked with cowboys. And I think that lifestyle would be all right too.

And finally, oxymoron n. A rhetorical figure in which incongruous or contradictory terms are combined, as in a deafening silence and a mournful optimist. That’s me. I am constantly contradicting myself. I think it’s a girls’ prerogative to do those sorts of things. Plus, it was the most creative name I could come up with (I SUCK at titling things). And it sounded really good together.

So there you have it, why I am who I am. I guess I’m not really hiding behind the name, because anyone who’s emailed me knows my name is Carrie. I just prefer to keep my kids’ and the hub’s names private because they never asked to be broadcast throughout cyberspace. But if you’re really just dying to know what my family’s names are, email me and I’ll gladly share.

Friday Fun

I had started this at my old blog as a weekly thing. Probably won't be weekly here because I can never guarantee that I'm feeling witty enough on Friday to participate in a survey or meme of some sort.

So here's one that I just got tagged for. Wanna do it? G'head. Leave me a comment so I can peek at it when you're done.

1. When did you first start blogging and why? August of 2004. She made me do it. I thought it sounded like fun and I wasn’t getting any creative writing done, so I thought writing about my bo-ring life would at least be writing SOMETHING.

2. What don't you talk about? I don’t talk about things that the hubs does that drive me insane. I did once and he read it and flipped the f*@% out. So yeah, I don’t say much about him. I also will not talk about politics or religion. Unless you ask me to. But even then, I don’t know.

3. Are you and your blogging persona the same person? I think so. I think my blog persona is way more entertaining though. Mostly because I can actually think before I write something. I talk with my hands a lot, so maybe it *is* more entertaining to watch me talk than read my posts. . .

4. How do you use blogging to build friendships? I’ve met some really cool people online. It’s fun to see what’s going on in other parts of the world. And it’s fun to see that a lot of it is exactly the same as it is out here in Podunk.

5. How would you describe your writing style? I write like I talk. I can’t always use written words to emphasize the way that I do when I speak, but I really try to make it sound like I’m sitting in front of you telling a story rather than just writing it down for posterity’s sake.

Obsess much?

When something is new and exciting for me, I tend to want to inhale anything and everything relative to the new thing. It's the reason that I posted something every single day when this blogging thing was new and exciting to me. It's also the reason why I can sit down and read a book (when uninterrupted) in about three hours.

Lately, that Thing seems to be Wicked. Already I've spent a better part of the last two days researching on You Tube and have watched the equivalent of the entire play at least twice. Once with the original cast and once with the cast that I saw. I've got the soundtrack and it's all that I can listen to while I'm anywhere. And I am going out tomorrow night for the soul purpose of finally buying my own copy of the book. I'll be like this for probably about another month or so, and then it will be something else that strikes my fancy.

In a bit of other news, one of the three frogs that got on the loose has shown up. Slightly decomposed and flattened underneath my garbage can in the bathroom. I don't know when he got there because we looked there on Tuesday and didn't see a thing. I have just finished a major cleaning of my bathroom because. . .eeeewwww!

Also, it's still hot here. Which means that the kids aren't outside much. Which means that the kids, they drive me crazy! I don't know how you full time stay at home moms do it! I swear the more I find for them to do the more they feed off the creativity and their energy level increases. We went to the park this morning before it got too hot. Then they walked with my dad over to his house for a little bit and they've been running around playing in the house for the rest of the time. I might dance the happy mother jig on the first day of school.

While they were playing, I got a chance to watch Rent for the first time. I've wanted to see the play since I heard Seasons of Love for the first time. But it was just. . .meh. I didn't really get into it until the end. And while I'm sure it's TONS better on stage, I'm glad that I didn't blow $80 (or more) on tickets to see it. Later tonight I'm going to watch The Producers and then my husband's brain will explode from all the musicals in this house.

But for now, I am hiding from the younguns and trying to come up with more to keep them busy.

We Don't Gnaw On Our Kitties.

CB and I are not your average parents by any stretch of the imagination. We've known that since the day CJ was born. But we're quite content in this insanity we call our life, so that's fun!

Anyway, I make this disclaimer because on Sunday we let our kids watch Austin Powers: The Spy Who Shagged Me. Now, before you get all concerned for the welfair of my kids and call CPS or something, we watched the entire movie in about 45 minutes. Which means we have seen the movie enough times to know when to mute, when to cover the kids' eyes and when to just fast forward. That being said, they LOVED it! Especially Mini-Me. And Fat Bastard when he goes on his tangent about wanting to eat Mini-Me. They laughed their little rears off when Mini-Me tried to eat his kitty (hence the title of this post) and have since become slightly obsessed with the guy.

At daycare yesterday, they went outside to catch frogs. There was a big storm yesterday, and apparently the time to go searching for frogs is right after the storm. I wouldn't know this because I am from the city and we just don't go a-frog huntin'. But the kids caught frogs & brought them home to show me. CJ named his "Mini-Me" and Diva named hers "Barbie" (a girl after my own heart, for sure). We had this grand plan to go let the frogs go down my the river today. Only the frogs (a third called Harry Potter, CJ's friend's frog) decided to escape last night. CJ was all angry when I got up this morning because he thought CB had released the frogs for us. Only CJ didn't and there are now three tiny little frogs wandering around my house. We have looked EVERYWHERE and cannot find them. Part of me thinks they crawled underneath the refidgerator and are now dead. Which means that there will be a whole heck of a lotta stink sometime in the next few days. Which also means I will not be cleaning the kitchen anytime soon. So, anyone else had this experience? Any ideas where the damn things ran off to?

Also yesterday, on the Austin Powers theme, Diva kept running around saying "I shall call him Mini-Me". It is so cute when she says it & I spent most of the evening laughing my butt off at them.

Now we're off to the library and to pick up an application for the coaching job. It sounds like it's much more dance than it is cheer, but it might still be fun. And if no one else applies, at least they'll be able to have it.

Later today we are going swimming at one of our friends' house. They have a man-made pond on their property, so it's better than a lake because the water is actually clear. Although, I still don't do so well with the idea of live things swimming underneath me, so I may just take the raft and call it good.

And the let down

So I finished reading Son of a Witch today. And it reminded me why I haven't ventured out of romance novels for quite some time. I like Happily Ever After. I like the ending delivered to me in a nice little package, wrapped with a pretty pink bow that says "Enjoy, everything works out fine in the end."

That was not the case with this book. There are so many unanswered questions after the last sentence. It's like the book was ended in the middle instead of following everything through. I can only hope that there will be a third book to tie up all the loose ends.

Bad endings are SUCH an annoyance to me. I hate feeling like I've invested all this time into something (whether it's a book or movie), only to have the end leave me feeling like it was a complete and total waste of time. And I seem to be having to deal with that feeling an aweful lot lately. There has been no less than two movies and at least this book that has left me feeling unsatisfied and a little moody after it's over. The worst of it all is that I will probably spend nights analyzing in my head what should have happened/what will happen next. But maybe it'll encourage me to do some writing of my own, so it might work out for the best.

I got a bit of interesting news today. Our high school has been without a cheerleading program for about three years. It sucks and I had thought about donating my time to get the program started back up. But up until now I haven't had the time or the energy to do anything like that. Well, lo and behold, the school is looking for a cheer/dance coach for the fall! I think I'm going to apply. I LOVED cheerleading & have felt that the school has been suffering for not having anyone to motivate the crowd to stay involved in the game, so this could be a really cool opportunity!

That's pretty much all I've got today. I'm off to watch Soul Plane with the hubs. A movie that I know is both entertaining and turns out in the end. Plus it's funny as heck!

The Oddities of Being Me

It's occurred to me lately that I have a rather strange morning routine. And if you've taken time to procrastinate through the 100 things link on the side, you'll see that I have a minor case of undiagnosed OCD. Which also applies to how I manage my time.

Really it all boils down to the fact that I hate mornings. With a passion. If I could train my children to wake up after 9:00 am on days off, I would cry tears of joy every damn night. Alas, they (along with CB) are all morning people. They cheerily get out of bed around 6:15 every morning, well-rested and ready to face the day. This hour is not an hour meant for cheeriness and happiness. It's barely an hour made for coherent thought. Luckily, they have finally figured out that it's not the best idea to wake me up and try inflict this happiness on me, so I do get to sleep a little bit longer.

But that's just a little aside about my mornings. I have them down to a science. My alarm is set for 7:30 (because the hubs doesn't understand my illness), but little does the man know that the clock is actually 3 minutes fast. Which means that I have my alarm set to go off at 7:27 on mornings that I work. This is because I need exactly 43 minutes to do the things that need to be done before we walk out the door. Here's a rundown of the rest of the morning.

7:27-7:43 am: Watch GMA, shake fist at annoying man who hosts the local news breaks. I hate him with a fiery passion that burns deep inside. Also, take shower, plan outfit and dress.

7:43-8:02 am: Check emails, check message boards, get kids breakfast and anything else that needs to be done.

8:02-8:09 am: Makeup and hair

8:09 am: Leave for work.

8:17 am: Arrive at daycare and drop kidlets off

8:23 am: Arrive at work.

So there you have it, that's my morning routine. I cannot stray from it. Even if I'm done with everything that needs to get done in the allotted time, I CANNOT start the next thing until it's time. And I watch the clock. It's sick really.

It also feeds into my hatred of being early or late. I hate being early because I hate the idea of being the first person anywhere. God forbid I come off looking like a kiss-up or something. And I absolutely cannot be late. It makes me cranky. Even if I arrive at work at 8:24, I feel like I'm behind, which makes the rest of the day seem off-kilter. It's sick really.

And the time thing works its way into any other outings that I am in charge of making us leave for too. I know exactly how long it will take me to get somewhere, so I plan it out to get there exactly when I want to--no earlier, no later.

The worst part about it all is that I am seriously the most unorganized person on the face of this planet. Except for when it comes to my morning routine.

SO there you have it. Verification that I am totally insane. How about you? Any strange rituals you'd care to share so I don't feel all alone here? C'mon! It'll be fun! :)

Speechless

Everytime I go to the theater, I have certain expectations. And everytime that the play starts, my expectations are totally blown out the window. That was totally the case last night.

In case you didn't hear my obsession the past few days, my mom and I went to see Wicked last night. It was FANTASTIC! I have never been to a play that seriously took my breath away. I sat there when the lights came up for intermission and I could. not. breathe. The singing, the songs, the characters. . .it was all amazing. I just can't even begin to describe it. Just make sure that you go if it comes anywhere near you because it's just. . .wow.

The rest of the day in civilization was fun too. We did a little shopping at a mall, then headed to Marshall Field's downtown Minneapolis. There we tried out some fun perfumes & mom bought some really good stuff. The lady that checked her out then gave us these kick ass samplers of Philosophy's skin care line. And if I had gobs of money to spend firvolously, I would have bought the entire line. She also gave us some yummy samplers of bodywash--Frozen Lemon Custard and Powdered Sugar Cookie. They smell delish and the lady at the counter was my new best friend.

After shopping, we went to Rock Bottom Brewery to have pretzels and Cosmos, then walked across the street to the Orpheum theater for the show. When the play was done, we got out just in time to see the Minneapolis Aquatennial candidates come by in the annual torchlight parade. It was fun to see the girl from our town that's up there as a candidate right now. And I think she was surprised to see us! :)

Now I'm home and the let down has begun. I love Minneapolis. And if I didn't have kids, I would be BEGGING CB to move up there. But I think the small town is the best route for raising the rugrats. For now anyway.

Thanks to everyone who gave input on the weird small town customs. It's fun to hear how different things are in just short distances. So keep the questions coming!

Questions from the Audience #1

Before I start--Let's have a warm welcome for this week's renter,Mama Come Here! She's another one that I always vote for over at blog explosion. I LOVE her template! Plus, us Minnesota girls have got to stick together! So make sure you pop over there and leave her a comment. And don't forget to tell her that I sent ya!

Wrigley asked:

so, i'm interested to see/read about what certain things (culture, customs) were new to you when you started living in Minnesota that you have never been accustomed to in CA.

Which is a really good question. And it was a HUGE problem for me when I moved here. But I was only 15, so the things that were HUGE problems, I now find beneficial as a mom.

For instance, everybody knows everybody here. When I lived in California, we made contact with two of our neighbors on a regular basis, and knew there were other people living in the house next door, but never met them. Here, everyone knew where our new house was before I had even said that we had moved. But I'm OK with this now, because I don't have to worry about my kids going to play at a friend's house, because I know their parents. We don't have to go through the awkward "You can't go until I meet their parents" BS that I had to go through EVERY. DAMN. TIME. I had a new friend invite me over.

The biggest thing that still bothers me (and kind of goes hand in hand with the first one) is the fact that everybody knows everybody's business. Prime example: My dad has recently started dating again. Last weekend he had a date over at his house for a while. It was quite late when she left. I had someone ask me about my dad's "girlfriend" and if she had stayed overnight at his house. I'm sorry, but that's not any of your business! Unless he was doing the wild monkey dance on the front porch for all to see, there is really nothing that you need to be concerned with.

Another thing that bothers me is that you are associated with your family for life. When someone introduces you to someone else, it's never, "Hi, Snootypants, this is Carrie." But it's "Hi, Snootypants, this is Carrie, you know Karen's granddaughter." Luckily my grandma was a FANTASTIC lady, so I don't mind being associated with her. My hubs, however, isn't so lucky back where he was born. He's got two cuh-razy aunts that live in his grandparents' house. So when he's associated to his family, people give him that "oh, poor you" look.

A few other strange customs around here that I still am not used to:
-People refer to soda as pop. I cringe everytime I hear this. There were many discussions with my friends as well. OK, they were debates. But this is the only area where they call it "pop". If you go to Minneapolis, they call it "soda". Drives me bonkers!

-Lunch is not the meal in between breakfast and dinner. Lunch is a snack.

-Dinner is not dinner. It is supper.

-Which means that the farmers' meal schedule is as follows: Breakfast (between 6:30 and 7:00 am), Morning lunch (9:00), Dinner (noon), Afternoon lunch (2:00-3:00), Supper (5:30-6:00), Bedtime lunch (8:00). This is all very confusing for the outsider, but it makes perfect sense to everyone around here. They all look at me cross-eyed when I say I'm having dinner at 6:00.

So there you have it. The short list of oddities in Podunk. Got more questions for me? Post them in the "Life is Dull" post below.

This is actually a busy week for us. Today Diva has a birthday party, tomorrow I'm off to see Wicked, Thursday is Bible study (which in itself is only an hour, but the social time afterwards takes up the rest of the night), Friday Diva has another birthday party, then (I think) the weekend is free! So stay tuned, I may actually have interesting posts this week!

Life is Dull

I think that's got to be my problem. Or at least that's why I've been jumping back into the past so much lately. My life has nothing exciting to post about. The kids haven't done anything blog worthy in quite some time (they are so well-behaved that it's scary sometimes). The CB hasn't done anything to drive me crazy in a while (he's overdue, though, so there's that). The job is mondane, but that's nothing out of the ordinary. So I just don't have anything to really blog about.

Which means I'm asking for your help. What would you like to see? Have any burning questions to ask me? Want me to take (G rated--had to add the disclaimer) pictures of anything around here? It's all up to you. Leave a comment here, and I'll randomly pick a few (or all of them) to blog about!

I Must Be Getting Old

Because I've been spending a lot of time reflecting on my past lately.

Yesterday I thought it would be fun to look up my old school:
And there it is. Conway Elementary School where I spent second through fifth grade. I remember walking under that awning for the very first time. Just beyond the right side building was the kindergarten area where I would help out in fourth and fifth grade. The library--the FANTASTIC library--was just beyond the shadows on the right. This was another library that I was always excited to go to. There was this cool, round, carpeted area where we would go once a week and the librarian would read us the latest award-winning children's book. I wonder if it's still as exciting to go there as it was when I did. . .

But the main reason to look up that school was to see if my fifth grade teacher was still there. I didn't see her name, so I decided to Google her. And I found her! And she sings in a women's barbershop quartet. A quartet that has won all sorts of awards and is even in the finals for the Oreo jingle contest! How crazy is that!?!

She was my favorite teacher because she actually made us feel like people. And she gave me my first shot at singing in front of people. It was the talent show and I had wanted to be in it sooooo bad! So, even though I didn't know anyone that played piano, I decided to go and sing "Part of This World" (from The Little Mermaid) a capella. I thought I had done pretty well, but I wasn't going to be able to be in it unless there was an accompanyment. And my teacher just volunteered just like that! We practiced a couple of times before the show, and I got to *be* Ariel in front of hundreds of people. I never would have gotten the chance if it hadn't been for her.

She showed me what being a teacher should be. And on career #5 when I was going to be a teacher, she was the model I had in mind. I can only hope that there are more teachers today that really and truly care about their students like she did/does. When I went back to California after my Senior year of high school, my mom and I stopped back at Conway to see if I could visit with my teacher. We went in, and she remembered me! She had thought about me when my friend passed away, and she was genuinely interested in knowing what I'd been up to all these years. It was fantastic!

So, in the hope of reconnecting, I shot off an email to the barbershop quartet's email address. I'm hoping that she still remembers me after all these years and that we can reconnect. Because she's a fantastic person and I would love to know more about what she's been up to lately.

I've also been thinking about the beach. But I think that's just because it's so damn hot and humid here that a dip in the ocean sounds like a little slice of heaven.

An HTML Guru, I am not

I've been trying to personalize my blog a little bit more lately. SO I thought I'd add pictures of a few of my favorite things. (And I just wanted to have a picture of the yumminess that is my *sole* permissible famous-crush Dierks Bentley) But even after I resized the pictures, they are showing up HUGE. When I look at my blog in frontpage, though, they are fine. Help me, people! Are all the pictures over there ---> ginormous, or is it just my computer?

There have been some vivid dreams going on in this head of mine as of late. Perhaps it's from eating ice cream before bed. Or perhaps I'm going a leeeeetle bit crazy. Could be since the baseball is now over and I have BOTH CHILDREN IN MY HOUSE ALL FREAKING DAY. And they expect to be entertained CONSTANTLY and I want to pull all my hair out.

Anyway, dream #1 was just plain odd. I was teaching the entire Royal Family (Princes William and Harry included) how to properly apply makeup. Then I was showing them how to make the makeup. And in order for the goop to set up properly, it had to soak in the toilet for a half hour. When it came out of the toilet, it looked like something that should have been flushed down the toilet. Which in turn caused the princes to throw up all over everything. Then I woke up and made sure I hadn't puked all over myself from the disgustingness of it all.

But dream #2 has had me thinking all day. I was whining to someone about how hard it is to write an entire damn book and I told them that I was going to just give up on it all. Then they looked right at me and said "If you don't do it, you'll regret it your whole life. You'll spend the rest of your days wrestling with 'what ifs'."

And it's so true. I've always been an overly-optimistic kind of gal. When I imagine doing things, it's always the best from the start. When I wanted to be a lawyer, I went straight from college to the DA's office. When I wanted to be an actress, I went from my first audition to my Oscar acceptance. And when I finally realized that writing really was my passion, I went straight from Once Upon a Time to Happily Ever After without filling in any of the blanks.

I like things that are easy. Like singing and dancing and laughing. I love writing too. But it just isn't so easy. You need all these extra things in there that I didn't need when writing poetry or marrying off my friends in little stories. And it's hard. I see all my writing friends doing it though. Perservereing through all the hard times and pouring every ounce of blood, sweat and tears into their passion. They do it. And they get published. And here I sit. Afraid of the first rejection letter. Afraid of even writing "the end" on something that I do write. And I'd been thinking about letting go of it. Up until last night.

The stranger in my dream (who looked like one of our dear friends, but it wasn't him) was right. If I don't at least try it, I'll spend the rest of my life thinking about "what ifs". So I'm going to stick with it. And maybe I won't start again until the kids are in school and I have my sanity back. But I will do it. And I will take all the rejections in stride. Because even if that's all I ever get, at least I know that I gave it my best shot.

I also had a dream that gas was only $2.45 a gallon. Which had me singing "A Dream is a Wish Your Heart Makes" all morning long. lol

It's Getting Hot in Herrrrre. . .

But don't worry. There will be no clothes leaving THIS body. It is freaking hot here though. The temperature only says 86, but the humidity we've been lacking all summer has come back with a vengance!

Have you visited my renter this week? If not, you should. She's AWESOME! So make sure you click over there and tell her that I sent you.

CJ had a playoff game today for baseball. Thank God it was at 9:00 this morning, otherwise I don't think I would have made it through the whole thing. And it was SUCH a good game! We ended up losing, but we had been behind by 8 in the last inning and the boys came back and tied it up! Then they went into extra innings and lost by 2. But it was so much fun! Now they're done for the year and CJ couldn't be happier. Which makes me sad because I come from a long line of sports fanatics. But CJ somehow missed that gene. And it's odd because even though CB didn't play that many sports (his parents didn't let him. That's a whole other post on its own), he's still competitive as all get out. I don't think CJ has a competitive bone in his body. Half the time when he's on defense, he's playing with something that captures his attention. So he usually misses the ball when it comes to him. But does he run after it? NO! He will WALK to get the ball. KILLS ME! But it's cute too, so I have to laugh.

In other news, who declared it Stupid People Day today and forgot to send me the memo? Because I've been forced to deal with some A-1 morons today. Add into the equation that it's hot and I'm tired and I am much less tolerant of the stupidness than I would be on a normal day.

But I'm home now. I've had my Phish Food ice cream and life has become much more bearable. Until tomorrow when it's even hotter than it was today.

I Am Conflicted

I have wanted to write something since Friday. But I don't know what to say. While life goes on, and since I didn't really know the kid that died, I actually had a really good weekend.

So do I write about that and all the fun things I did? No, because if I do that, then I feel like I'm disrespecting the family.

Do I keep dwelling on the fact that a kid that I'm sure I at least saw at one of my brother's little get togethers is dead? Probably not, because it brings up too many sad things about the important people I've lost.

But the funeral was today at the high school. From what the Glamour Dad said, it was an incredibly sad time. I guess he was buried in his baseball jersey. The whole class got together before the funeral to spend some time together, then were all escorted in after the family. The bits and pieces that I've heard bring tears to my eyes. And I feel stupid for the fact that it hurts so bad. I can't explain it to those of you who live in a bigger area. This is a town of 3,000 people. So when something like this happens, it's almost like extended family.

So I think I'll allow myself this one last post to be sad. And tomorrow I'll try and move on. Just please don't ever think me disrespectful. Because like I said, life does move on. We will all grow and learn from this. But I still have a family. Two kids that don't understand what's going on and had waaaay too much fun passing out candy in a parade on Saturday.

But I'll get to all of that soon enough.

Sadness on the Plains

I was all ready to tell you about the fantastic weekend that we had. And that's still coming, I promise. But today is much too sad of a day. Yesterday afternoon, a kid from around here was killed in a 4 wheeler accident. He was supposed to be a senior in high school this year. He was a star pitcher for the baseball team. And he was supposed to play in a Legion baseball game last night. But there was no game because he didn't wear a helmet when he was out playing on his 4 wheeler.

Apparently what happened is he was riding in a road ditch and going across a driveway. Somewhere after the driveway, he hit an embankment and the ATV slipped out from underneath him. Then it landed on top of him.

My heart hurts for a mom who has lost her baby. For a father that has lost his only son. And for a sister that lost her brother. For a class of tight-knit kids that are now one short.

But most of all, my heart hurts for the friend that was with this kid when it all happened. Because the friend will have a haunting picture with him for the rest of his life. Tons of "what if" scenarios will run through his head. And he will have to know that he was with someone when they died.

I want to do something. But I don't know the kid. I don't know the family. I think I maybe worked with his mom once upon a time, but I'm not for certain. I want to just go and wrap my arms around these people. I want it to be a teaching moment for the kids that knew him. I want to take the pain away from these people. And I know I can't. I know they will survive. But today, everyone is so sad, and I can't do anything about it.

So if you have kids, hug them extra tight tonight. You just never know what can happen.

Work work work

I am at work. I do not want to be at work. It is beautiful outside. The sun is shining, the kids are going to a park to play. And I? Am in a room with no windows. Which is a good thing I suppose. I can't glance longingly outside at all the things I'm missing.

I can, however, bitch about all the squillion things that I need to get done before this weekend. Things that I could be doing TODAY on my usual DAY OFF. But I probably won't. Not much, anyway. I have to type up at least 10 slides for a power point presentation tomorrow night. I also have to find pictures for said slide show. And we have bible study tonight, which takes up the whole evening when I have to work. Which means that I will probably pull a very late night tonight to get most of the pp slides done. Then I'll have a little time tomorrow night before the concert to do the final touches.

And one of these days, I'll come back here and tell you about my ultra-fantastic 4th of July.

Someday when my sanity is back.

Until then, go visit my renter. I'm sure she's got MUCH more interesting things to talk about.

More fun nostalgia. And, GO SEE MY RENTER!

First things first, my renter for this week is Chelle-Belle. Her blog looks so cool! That's the reason I picked her. I'm looking forward to checking her out more this week, and you should too! Just make sure that if you go there, you leave a comment letteing her know I sent ya.

Now, on to the nostalgia thing. I spent most of my childhood living in one of two apartment complexes that my mom managed. In the second one, there was a single mom from Mexico that had two little girls. She cleaned apartments, which was what my mom had done before she started managing. Needless to say, those two hit it off. And that was good for me because the girls and I were quickly best friends. I remember going to their house to play and Socorro would have her "Novellas" on the TV (Those things have always facsinated me, even though I can only understand like three or four words.). If I would come at lunch time, she would on occasion be making this fabulous chicken and rice dish. I would be able to smell it before I even walked up the stairs to their apartment. And it tasted like heaven. I've never known anyone that could cook like she could. I remember how sad I was when we moved back to the other apartments and Socorro and her girls moved away. I missed my friends, and I missed that cooking!

So why all the nostalgia? Last night when we were watching the fireworks that get put on by the casino in town, we were sitting in the car with the windows down and I smelled it. I smelled the way her chicken would smell as she was cooking it. And it smelled fantastic! It was a great little trip down memory lane. The worst thing of it all is I have NO idea where it had come from. We were parked next to a field, which was next to another field and another and so on. There wasn't a single house that I could see. Had there been one, I probably would have run out of the car and tried to find out who was cooking what! lol

Well, I'm off to the Fourth of July festivities in Podunk Jr. Have a great day!

No The Garage Sale Did Not Eat Me

I'm posting just because Big Sky Girl was scared that maybe the garage sale gods had chosen me for their sacrafice. The thing actually went pretty well. It probably would have gone better if I hadn't decided to do it on a long weekend, but I made enough moolah to get the kids some more new clothes to replace all the old ones they had outgrown.

It's a strange feeling, having garage sales. When I was pulling all the stuff out to sell, I was getting a little verklempt. I mean, my kids were that. small. And it wasn't all that long ago. It seems like the time has gone by way too fast to be fair. Then I started thinking about people's grubby hands all over my kids' old stuff and I almost packed it all up and put a big "CANCELLED" across the signs that I had made. But I didn't. And there were no grubby people. There were a lot of really nice people. Not even one scary person. Which was kind of disappointing.

Yesterday we went to see the movie Cars. It was THE best kid movie I've seen in a while. We had already decided that it was a purchasable movie not two minutes into it. Even if you don't have kids, it's a great movie. Funny, funny grown up jokes in it, but good fart jokes too. And the kids picked up on some really valuable lessons that can be learned from the movie too.

And now today we are going to finish putting all the garage sale crap away. Then we have gobs of laundry to put away. And other crap to organize. But it's all OK, because I got to sleep until 9:00 this morning.

D-Day

Garage sale day and I've been up since four this morning. I have neither the ambition nor the wit to write an actual post today, so head on over to Stupid People Shouldn't Breed and see my guest post there.