Not A Prude

Anyone that knows me, knows that I'm not a prude. 

 I know how to have a good time, but this.... 

SERIOUSLY.DISTURBS.ME.

Those are not the costumes I was considering for myself this year.

Those are the TWEEN costumes my TWELVE YEAR OLD had to choose from this year.  

Really???  Thank you so much for including those SEE THROUGH TIGHTS with that ADULT costume that isn't more than a freaking TUBE TOP!!  That so makes this more appropriate for my child that is just barely beginning to notice boys.  Way to tell her that slutting it up is the way to get their attention.  

OH.  And they wanted $35 - $40 for that crap! 

 Break my wallet and turn my kid into a hooker at the same time.  

I refused.  We ended up with this, a Geisha costume.

CRAP!

My twelve year old is dressing as a hooker for Halloween!  

OH WELL, at least she's going to be a COVERED UP hooker.  

(yes, I know, Geisha weren't really hookers, the Orian were the hookers)

Oh yeah, and this covered up costume...  $14.99.

Sweet!

But next year, I'm boycotting store bought costumes.  

Like it or not, my kids and I will all be dressing like this next Halloween.

I'm just disappointed that I didn't find all these great homemade costume ideas from

 Disney's Family Fun until after I had wasted two days driving all over town

 trying to find prude costumes for my kids.

Close but no cigar

Here is the latest offering by the Verizon insurance people.

As you can see, they at least got the right screen on this one, but it still has the wrong navigation buttons. Of course it's too late to call now, but I'm making the hubby call first thing tomorrow. I bet you he gets me a brand new phone, not any more of this refurbished crap. He's good at things like that.

F#&king Frakenstein Fone Friday

Monday morning my phone took a dive into the toilet. Brilliant, I know. It's KARMA biting me in the ass for laughing at my husband for fumbling his brand new Blackberry Storm into a sink full of water. I called him "Fumbles" for days. That will teach me.

So of course the hubby was in no particular hurry to call the insurance to get me a new phone. He did turn on his old Curve for me to use and he finally called the insurance on Tuesday. Wednesday my new phone shows up. I haven't even touched it yet and he's already on the phone bitching about the trackball not working right. Fabulous.

He gives me the phone and tells me he will go to the Verizon store the following morning to get it swapped out for me. I finally get to try and use it and I immediately see what the deal is. The trackball works only about one out of every three times you push it.

So yesterday I had to work, so I left without my phone so he could take it to the store. I get home from work and he tells me that, of course, the trackball didn't act up at all in the store. Figures. He did however get the insurance to agree to send me out a different phone. It should come today.

SO last night I'm looking at my phone, and something just doesn't look right. I look up on Verizon's site and find this picture. This is what my phone is supposed to look like. This is what the one that went swimming in the potty looked like.

The phone the insurance sent me looks like this.

Notice something wrong??

It looks like they took pieces from this Blackberry

and mixed it up with a pink one.

No wonder it doesn't work right. F#&king Frankenstein Fone.

The cure for what ails you is candy.

I have this thing about taking the kids to the doctor. I pretty much try to avoid doing it as much as possible. Not that I don't believe in modern medicine, but I also believe in my mother's intuition and the knowledge I have gained by the umpteen thousand trips to the doctor I have already made with my children. Sometimes it's better to just wait it out.

My husband however thinks that they need to go every time they sniffle. "That's why we have insurance" he says. He's gone a lot though, so usually I let things ride. If they have a cold, they get tylenol, fluids, and rest. Why should I go pay a $20 co-pay to have the doctor tell me that. And why would I want to risk exposing them to something even yuckier while we are there. Like the time Kimberly thought she had scurvy, and I thought it might be strep. I took her to the doctor to find out it was just a plain old ordinary sore throat and you know what happened? She picked up pink eye from some other kid in the waiting room.

Last week Tiff had a little bump on the underside of her tongue. She showed it to me and I pretty much ignored it. It looked like she had just irritated it, and besides, things in your mouth usually heal pretty quickly. I figured it would go away on it's own in a few days. Then a couple of days later she showed it to her dad. He flipped out. "We need to get her into the doctor today." "what do you mean she showed it to you days ago and you ignored it?" So the next morning I'm sitting with her in the doctor's office. The diagnosis - blocked salivary gland. The prescription - sour candy. Yup. Candy. So like she would have been cured come Sunday anyway, without the trip to the doctor? So we go to CVS buy every kind of sour candy they sell and I take her to school. I write a note to her teacher saying "yes the doctor really did say she needed to eat this candy" and go about the rest of my day.

Then Saturday right after the carnival, my mom notices that the topside of Tiff's tongue is looking odd. Starts saying stuff like Scarlet Fever and my hubby is eating it up. That night he went out to run some errands and while he was gone she starts complaining that her mouth hurts and shows me that she has several canker sore looking things inside her lip. Crap. Urgent care here we come. He comes home, we eat dinner, I tell him about the latest developments in her mouth and he says call the quack doctor back. Because of course this has to be some case of the doctor misdiagnosing her the first time, even though the candy totally made the bump go away. It couldn't possibly be that she caught some other thing while we were there. So after dinner it's off to urgent care.

Now one of the coolest things I've ever seen in my entire life is a Pediatric urgent care that is open every night and all weekend long, because you know your kid never gets sick during regular business hours. It's always at 5 pm on Friday, or 9 pm Saturday like this was. Even all the regular urgent cares were already closed. It was a bit of a drive but way better than the emergency room which would have been the only other option. There wasn't even anyone else in the waiting room when we got there.

We see the doctor and he says it's a virus. Very common in kids but usually seen in ones a little smaller than my 7 year old. Of course she sucks her thumb so I totally get how she's getting things that little kids that can't keep their hands out of their mouths get. Being that it's a virus there is nothing to do but wait it out.

My husband totally doesn't get that antibiotics don't work on viruses. If they have a cold, he thinks they should get a prescription. No matter what is wrong, if you don't have to go to the pharmacy when you are done at the doctor's office, the doctor is a quack. In the car on the way home after trying to explain to him why this doctor did not give her any medicine I thought that I should just start asking the doctors to give me a prescription for something harmless that I could go to the pharmacy and fill because as long as I came home with that amber bottle, my husband would be satisfied and wouldn't even notice if it was filled with vitamins.

This morning he tells me he wants me to her back to the pediatrician. "Why?" I ask. "To get a second opinion" is his reply. Really, how about to waste a third $20co-pay and maybe get yet another nasty germ. No.Thank.You. He wasn't too pleased with my answer and we pretty much didn't talk all morning, but I didn't take her to the doctor either, so I guess I won that one.

Holidays

I have a love hate relationship with holidays. I love them for the candy, presents, and cute decorations, but I hate being required to go to dinner at my moms for every one. Sometimes I just wish that we didn't have holidays at all, or that I lived on a different continent than my mom when they come around.

Yeah, it's that bad.

Since I was young, I remember my mom being a raving bitch for every single holiday. She gets up at the crack of dawn to start cooking and tries to get all Martha Stewart for a bunch of people who would be happy with a hot dog. There is the inevitable trip to the grocery store that I have to make to pick up the one item she forgot to purchase when she did her shopping for the event. Yup, even if it's just me and the kids coming, it's an event. Following that comes the bitch out for taking so long at the store, what did you do that it took so long and now everything is going to be overcooked by the time the whatever was missing the ingredient is done. Somehow she forgets that there is only ONE store open on major holidays and that everyone forgets one thing and they are all at that ONE store which is horribly understaffed because they gave everyone the day off because it's a HOLIDAY. Then there is the obligatory oohing and ahhing over the overly fancy food, because if you don't you are an ingrate, followed by the mandatory cleaning of the kitchen and washing up all the dishes because it would be just rude to make your hostess feed you and clean up after you too.

So here I am with Easter a week away, already having panic attacks about the upcoming event.

I thought about trying to weasel out of it, making other plans and telling my mom "Oh sorry, I didn't know you wanted to do something and so I made these plans", but I know she would see right through that one. If I was ordered to come over for dinner for a minor holiday like St. Patrick's Day, of course I should know without being ordered that I am required to be in attendance at Easter. So I'll keep my afternoon open and wait for my marching orders which I'm sure will arrive sometime next week.

Unless I could move to Australia before then.

How to ruin St. Patrick's Day

Those of you who have been reading my blog for a year or more know that St. Patrick's Day is one of my most favorite holidays (after my birthday and Christmas because those involve presents). I am Irish after all. What a wonderful holiday to celebrate my heritage, eat one of my favorite foods (after lobster and cheesecake) corned beef and cabbage, and maybe ingest a green beverage or ten.

So you want to know how this St. Patrick's Day got ruined? My mom. My mom who's universe revolves around me, who lacks any friends of her own to invite over to her St. Patrick's Day dinner, tells me that I AM to come over for dinner tonight. Not an invite. Not, "hey would you like to have St. Patrick's Day dinner at my house?". Nope. These were her exact words. "Don't buy a corned beef brisket because I already got one". Oh. So with that I was EXPECTED for dinner at her house tonight. I've been dreading it since she dropped that little bomb a week ago.

SHE isn't even Irish. I got all my Irish from my DAD who was BORN.IN.IRELAND. I want to cook my own corned beef damn it!!! I want to have my own family tradition with MY kids. She already has laid claim to Thanksgiving, Christmas, and Easter. Can't I have freaking St. Patrick's Day??? Crap.

Then to make matters worse. She has to go and try to make some fancy corned beef recipe. Put a bunch of extra garbage in there like cloves and G-d knows what else and you know what it tasted like?? Brine. It was so freaking salty all I could taste was SALT and more SALT. Irish cooking is simple. You boil everything. And corned beef is one of those few things that isn't ruined when you boil it. The flavor from just peppercorns, the cabbage, and some onions is all it needs.

So next year, I'm buying my corned beef brisket in January and inviting all my friends over well in advance so if my mom tries this stunt again, I'll be ready with. "Oh sorry mom, you should have asked me first. I ALREADY have plans OF.MY.OWN."

Everything and Nothing

I wish I had a nifty excuse for why I'm yet again being a terrible blogger. I don't. I can't even say that I've been busy, because even though there is a ton of stuff I should be doing, fact is, I've been spending most of my time reading books and trying to ignore anything that needs done. If I'm lost in a good book, I can't be stressed about the chaos in my life.

I'm still clueless about where I will be living in a month. The hubby is working on a totally awesome business idea, and if that comes through, we will be moving to Michigan. Until that is finalized though, there is nothing to do but wait. I can't even be seriously looking for a new place either here or there and the stress is making me nuts.

I seriously considered going to the doctor and getting on some antidepressants because most days I wake up and just want to crawl back in bed and hide. Since that isn't an option, I've been trying to make myself be productive. Last week I spent a whole day out in my garage trying to sort out what I need and what I can get rid of. I figured that one way or another, I'm going to have to move somewhere, and when I do, it will be easier without so much stuff. I got through everything on one side of the garage and it is my goal to work on the other side this week.

I also got started on my book. I finished the first chapter and have worked out most of the main story line. So far I'm laughing my ass off, so hopefully others will find it as funny as I do.

Oh, and last week some real estate agent locked me out of my house. My key being in the lockbox, I've been coming in through the garage, and instead of leaving things the way they found them, they decided to lock every possible lock, including the one from the garage into the house and my screen door. Plus there was yet another agent that showed up an hour past the window of time she had given me. I have now started asking all agents that call if they own a watch and can tell time.

This and That

Again a week has gone by without writing. I just didn't have anything monumental to write about. I was all bummed that my little vacation was over and I moped for days. I didn't get much of anything accomplished, but I forgive myself. So here are the few little highlights of my week. Not neccessarily good things, just stuff that happened.

Directv DVR sucks monkey butt

My Directv DVR decided to erase or not record all the season premieres that played last week. I turned on the tv the other night to watch some tube and found my list EMPTY. Not a thing there, and I have no friggin clue why. I'm seriously pissed. I seriously follow about 10 shows, all three CSI's, Bones, House, Pushing Daisies, and well a few others I can't name right now. Ok so let's say 6 shows. The CSI's especially all ended with nifty cliffhangers that I wan't to see the resolution to. Hopefully they are all on the internet. It just reminds me of the fact that Directv used to have Tivo, and Tivo kicks DVR butt. I still have one in my living room, but the kids have taken control of it recording all kinds of kid crap. The only good thing about the DVR was it had WAY more recording space, but what does that matter if it just RANDOMLY erases everything??? The Tivo never did that.

Inconsiderate Real Estate Agents should be strung up by the toenails

People came last night to see my house. Not at 5:30 when they said they would and I was purposely out of the house, because it's just weird watching strangers walk through your house, but an hour late at 6:30 when I was in the middle of trying to do homework with Kimberly and making a salad. Rude! Rude I tell you. It put me in a funk for the rest of the night. It made it all the more real to me that someone is going to buy this house, and more than likely want to live in it, because it is after all a really awesome house, and I'm going to be forced to move to a way less awesome house.

Change is not always good

I bought a new kind of coffee at the store. I'm kinda new to coffee, being like the last 30 something year old on the planet that didn't own a coffee maker until about 6 months ago when after mentioning to my mom that it might be nifty to have one, she picked one up for me at Kohl's for 10 bucks. It sat in the box under my bed for another couple of months until I decided to start using it when I had to give up soda as a means of self medicating myself with caffiene. My friend Alisha was staying with me then, and she actually knew how to make the coffee maker make coffee. She went to the store and bought coffee and filters and taught me how to do it. Ever since then I have been buying the same coffee that she did. Last week I decided to change it up. Bought some kind of Brazilian Blend. It sounded good, but it tastes like crap.

That might make a good book

I got this crazy idea to write a book. Not some kind of auto biography or witty book about parenting like other bloggers are doing, NOPE pure fiction. One day last week this thought popped into my head. "Hey, a book about a talking dog with tourette's syndrome would be really cool" it said. So I started pondering it, and I've since come up with some other great characters and now I'm working on what those characters are actually going to do.