Thursday, October 29, 2009

I should be dead

On wednesday I nearly died. That could be an exaggeration. Maybe. It was one of those rare San Diego days where the weather matches up with the season. It was windy and cold. Instead of my usual shorts and t-shirt I had a wool sweater, jeans, and paint speckled boots on.

I had just stopped at the grocery store and was on my way to pick up Amelia and her two friends from school. I was leisurely making my way down Charger Boulevard when I saw something falling from the sky. I thought it was a dead body. I don't know why I thought that, maybe I am dark and sadistic or perhaps I have a mental problem. Who knows, but for whatever reason for a split second I was convinced that a dead body was plummeting toward my car.

Luckily it was not a corpse. It was a branch. In my defense it was a flesh colored branch. It was big, the size of an anorexic man. The wind had blown it clear off a eucalyptus tree. It landed right in front of my car. I came to a shrieking stop, heaved a sigh of relief , and drove my car around it. I suppose I could've been less lazy and gotten out of my car to remove the branch but I didn't. I was too focused on the idea that I had nearly died.

If the branch had landed on my car there would have been some serious damage, like a bleeding, gushing, death laden head injury. I was lucky. If I hadn't have spent those 2 seconds speaking to the elderly lady in the produce section about just how juicy the 98 cent per pound apples were, I may be a dead woman. Or if the deli manager at Henry's had ordered soup spoons instead of forgetting; If I hadn't have frantically searched the store before settling on a spork to go with my black bean soup I might not be here right now typing this. Or perhaps I would be here but out a couple hundred dollars on a costly car repair, or maybe not out any money at all but instead slumming it around town in a junker with a branch dent in it's roof.

Basically, My day with the branch would make for an awesome choose your own adventure story.

Wednesday, October 28, 2009

Style inspiration

Recently I watched the edge of love, while it wasn't a fantastic movie I adored their clothing.  This winter I plan to copy their style with some vintage dresses, high waisted skirts, cute boots, and loads of cardigans.





Tuesday, October 27, 2009

Monday, October 26, 2009

Santa Claus is a fake

Yesterday Amelia informed me that "Santa Claus is not real momeeee!"

The day before, over dinner,  Andrew's best friend filled me in on the fact that they are learning about sex in science class.  When I looked shocked Andrew explained:

"Mom, We're just learning about the flowers but basically it's sex, okay.  We get it. I know what sex is"

I am not ready for my ten year old to use the word sex in a sentence.  In fact I am still not ready to use the word sex in a sentence with my own mother.  My catholic repressed side is screaming from the inside.

They are growing up too fast.  The next thing I know Jacob will be sprouting arm pit hair and Andrew will have Acne coupled with a smoking problem.

Friday, October 23, 2009

The reader cover this week

Two blog entries of mine were choosen as part of the reader cover story this week.  Here's the link: Another perfect day

The price of procrastination

It had been one of those mornings. I was up late the night before writing three essays for my english midterm and  had woken up when it was still dark out to study some more. At 7:45 I made my way downstairs to find my kids on the computer. Jake's hair was sticking up in every direction and Andrew was wearing a spaghetti sauce stained shirt from the day before. I issued commands for them to pour themselves some cereal, brush their teeth, and hair, and for the love of good put clean shirts on.

We barely made it to their school on time. While Andrew was exiting the car he panickly announced, "I left my book bag at home!"

"You have got to be kidding me! I can't go back to get it. I have a midterm this morning!" I tell him

"What about my lunch!" he whines.

"Fine, I'll pick something up for you!"

So that's why I end up at a shell station at 8:45 am on Thursday with my hair still wet from my morning shower and a coffee stain on the knee of my jeans. I park at a pump and decide to fill up my half empty tank.

I make my way toward the convenience store but not before almost being mowed down by a man in one of those ridiculous monster trucks.  It's the kind with mud flaps and it is plastered with No Fear stickers. I turn around and give him the mental finger with my eyes. Normally, I would have no problem flicking him off but I am at a gas station buying lunch for my ten-year-old son. I think I have filled my trashy quota for the day.

Inside I pour myself more coffee and add artificial pumpkin spice creamer. I scan the shelves for something that will not cause Andrew a heart attack upon ingestion. I find a can of microwavable chicken noodle soup, a banana, and string cheese.

When I get outside monster truck man is pumping gas across from my car. He is staring at me through blood shot eyes. I give him a look that is supposed to express the fact that I think he is an ass. He nods. I nod.

Before I know it he is standing next to me. He is reaching into his wallet and he is handing me a small white card. I take it, look it over,  and wonder what he is trying to sell me, motor oil, life insurance, some sort of pyramid scheme?  I am annoyed and at the same time confused.

"Ummm...?"

" I think you're real pretty. I 'm Jeff." he tells me taking his hand out of his cargo shorts so I can shake it.

I'm so perplexed as to what is going on that it takes me a few minutes to realize that he is hitting on me.

My face turns red. I stare at a small section on the top of his forehead so as to avoid his eyes and tell him,

"Thanks but i'm married."

I politely hand him back the card, he refuses, winks and says, "keep it."


This sort of thing happens to my husband not me.  Aaron is an old lady magnet. He always has been. If he hadn't have married me I am certain he would be living in La Jolla. His wife would be a rich lady with blue hair. He would drive a porsche around, own numerous poddles, and they would be members of the Shakespeare Society adn attend gallas.

At my brothers wedding my aunt took a picture of Aaron's ass in his tuxedo pants. "he's got a great butt." she told me later. When we went to Ireland to visit my family, my middle aged cousins told him he looked like a soap star and hugged him a little too long .

Once at Ruby Tuesdays a woman tried to pick up on him while he waited for our daughter outside the ladies room "I'm not normally this forward." she purred, " but  you're an extremely attractive man."  She too had graying hair. 

Aaron loves it.  Even more he loves to brag about it. He'll come home from work and tell me about the waitress who told him he had pretty eyes.

"Did she have real teeth or dentures?' I'll ask.

The truth is, I can't wait to tell Aaron about my gas station encounter. I fish my wallet out of my purse and stick the card in it to take out later when Aaron gets home from work. I consider leaving out the part about the man's strange body odor. After all, is that part really necessary?

I reach over to fasten my seat belt and notice something shimmering near my chest. I look down and realize that the two top buttons of my shirt are undone.  My over priced Victoria Secret push up bra is out there for the world to see.

It's a ridiculous bra, one I rarely wear. It was purchased last year right after Christmas. My Mother-in-law had given me a victoria secret gift card, of all things. At first I thought it was creepy. Later she explained that she knew I couldn't spend it on anyone other than myself.  Unlike a gift card for Target or macys At V.S. I would be ubale to buy items for other memebrs of my family.  I bought the bra because i figured I might as well go all out.

Because this particular bra  pushes my boobs up to my throat, it is always in the back of my closet. That morning I had fished it out because all of my other bras were in the laundry basket heaped in the corner of my bedroom.

Looking down at my exposed cleavage I realize that there is no way in hell that I would have gotten truck mans business card without the boobs.   I am certain that he thnks I am a lonely housewife who wears satin robes when the plumber or deliver guy stops by. 

 I button it up and quickly speed past the monster truck driver. This time I have no problem flicking him the bird. I try not to think about weather or not my shirt was open while dropping off my kids at school a few minutes earlier.

That's what I get for procrastinating!

Saturday, October 17, 2009

what we want

On the car ride home from Bates Nut Farm I asked each kid what they would want if they could have anything at all. The boys were predicatable, Jake said "Easy, if I could have anything at all it would be an X-box 360."

Andrew grumbled "Halo 3 and Call of Duty World at War, which you would never let me own anyway!"

Aaron said "I don't like this game and I don't need anything."

Amelia's answer was the greatest ever " I would want a bunny but not a real bunny, a pretend bunny that hops and doesn't poop but only pees a little bit and it talks too." Um okay, not exactly what I had expected but interesting!

Pumpkin patch visit from hell

I think that we missed the divine message last week when we rolled up to a closed pumpkin patch. That message being : "For the love of god do not take your ungrateful children to the pumpkin patch."

Today we trekked out to Bates nut farm. We shouldn't have.

Everything was all fun and dandy until Aaron decided to divvy out $7 per child, handing them over the cash to spend how ever they wanted. "Just decide where and how you want to spend it." he told them.

This caused general displeasure when one kid made a far more awesome choice then the other kid, or when Jake won a cool gun and Andrew didn't, or when Jake decided to not share his massive bag of cotton candy with Andrew. It was a mess; a mess I tell you!

Andrew some how managed to barter a fruit smoothie that was priced at $4 down to his very last $3 which was something Jake hadn't thought of. He was pretty outraged. "you can ask to pay less!" I am pretty sure that now my kids will attempt to barter at normal places like Target or the Gap. This will undoubtedly lead to later embarrassment.

Anyway, the shit really hit the fan when Andrew scored that smoothie. It even had whipped cream, tons of it! There was whining, some full on temper tantrums, and lastly pushing... all steaming back to the stupid smoothie!

It is always a pleasure to be out in public with my children. It did make me feel better that I saw handfuls of children in tears today. It was not only my children. Who knows, maybe their dad also handed them a fistful of cash to spend wisely?

pictures!

future husband and wife.


On a mission to spend money








Jake pleading for a sip of the evil smoothie

  Andrew bartering the price down. 

Wednesday, October 14, 2009

Weaker than your Grandma

I over it did it on the stairs today. We have these stairs, on the other side of town, right past the grocery store and surrounded by eucalyptus trees; they go straight up. They are mountainous-monster stairs!

I went up and down them 5 times today. That may not seem like much ....but I walked up and down the stairs for 30 whole mintues!

It's all because of the 50-year-old woman with her weights . Seriously, home girl carried 5 pound weights in each hand while she maneuvered the stairs without breaking a sweat. She was like a machine! 

After two rounds of walking up and down I thought I might die. I am not in terrible shape either. I should be able to out stair any, and all 50-year- old women, with the exception of Susan Sarandon who is unnaturally amazing for her age. You'd think having a 20 year advantage I could over take Grandma with her weights. I couldn't.  Because she continued to walk up and down without showing the slightest signs of fatigue I felt the need to really push myself.

Granny insisted on making small talk when we passed one another. Little conversational gems like "Wow, it looks like it may rain." and "The air is so crisp today." I would nod and fake smile while inwardly hating her. It was ridiculous.

Grandma definitely lowered my self worth today. The walk home was rough. It felt like my knees were rubber. I will  be  paying for this in the days to come.

Sunday, October 11, 2009

How we spent our Sunday

As usual we frustrated our children today. We drove out to Oma's Pumpkin Patch for some good 'ole hay- riding, pumpkin picking, and maze running, only to find out that it is closed on Sundays. Amelia cried --a lot. She got over it when we drove past the coolest park in the world. Not only did it have a tire swing, but it also had a see-saw, a trampoline built into the ground, a merry-go-round, and some bad-ass zebra bouncy thing.

"Do you think it's a public park?" Aaron and I both wondered aloud since most of the stuff was straight out of the early 80's, the kind of playground equipment that schools no longer have due to insurance issues. We decided that it had to be public. There was a large gravel area that resembled a parking lot. We parked our car amongst the tiny white pebbles and proceeded to have the most awesome time the five of us have had in months, maybe even years (that could be an exaggeration, after all i rented Beatles Rock Band this weekend which is ahh-some!).

The trampoline was a hit, Aaron taught the boys all sorts of terribly dangerous games like don't break the egg and the double bounce. He has a pretty knarly scar on his forehead from a childhood trampoline trick gone wrong. This trampoline was moderately safe due to the fact that it was built into the ground. There was no blood, thankfully!

I was the most thrilled over the see-saw. I still remember the devastation I felt as a child when they started removing see-saws from local parks. At age six, they were my playground equipment of choice . Unfortunately there is no comfortable way for a thirty-year-old woman to play on a see-saw. It just doesn't work. I attempted to see-saw with Amelia but I have a good 80 pounds on her so it was pretty much a waste of time. The boys, however, see-sawed their little hearts out.
About a half an hour into our visit to the greatest park in the world, a car drove by slowly, rolled down the window, and appeared to really want to talk to us. After a minute or so they drove away. Weird, I thought.

Fifteen minutes later another car rolls up. I realize that more likely then not we are not playing at a public park. "Hey , hate to bother you but his is our backyard." says the polite man in the car. "we built the playground for our grand kids. We've always joked that someday someone would mistake it for a real park."

"Are we the only ones who have?" I ask

"yep!" he laughs

We compliment him on the amazing park he has created and politely make our exit. I scrawled down their address and plan on sending them a thank you/apology letter. We are dumb asses!





Trying to figure out waht's under the trampoline







Saturday, October 3, 2009

Amelia Birthday letter number 5

Amelia,
You are 5; five-years-old already. You told me that next year you will be 6 but after that you will not be 7, 8,or 9. You will stay six forever. You don't want to go to kindergarten or ever have homework like the boys. Instead you will be little forever. I am okay with the idea of you being small forever. My friend Jessica asked you if you have a magic pill for that sort of thing because she would like one. This annoyed you and you rolled your eyes at her as if to say "You are an idiot! I am the only one allowed to stay the same age forever because I am awesome, and you are not!"



The fact that you are the oldest kid in your preschool class makes you very happy. You like to rub it in. Last week you had two of your friends over and told them "Soon I will be five and you will still be 4!" I had to talk to you about kindness and bragging. Whenever I talk to you about these kind of things you make a face like this:



Right now your major interests include, play-doh, you have the ability to sit at the kitchen table fro hours playing with play-doh. You also love to make books. You have me staple white sheets of paper together and you draw pictures on every page. You dictate what you would like me to write on them. You love to ride your bike and think it's pretty rad that you are the only one in your class that can ride a two-wheeler. Lastly you love littlest pet shop toys. When you play with them you create little worlds for them with love and conflict. You are highly creative and I love that about you. You have a great imagination.



You have a small crush on a boy named Marco. He is in the second grade and has a full head of brown curls. You draw pictures for him and bravely, unabashedly give them to him. His face always turns bright red when you do this. You follow him around after school and wave at him. It's cute but has me a little concerned that you will be one of those girls that has posters of boy band members all over your room. I like the fact that you are brave about your crushes because I never was. I was always awkward and would stare down at the ground whenever I was in the presence of a boy I had a crush on. I like your confidence.



When I found out that I was having a girl I hoped most of all that I would do a good job in making sure you had confidence. As a kid I had terribly low self esteem. I even named you Amelia after Amelia Earhart who was a brave and strong woman. I think you are living up to your name. I am proud of your strength and confidence. I am so very blessed to have you in my life.




Happy Birthday Amelia!

Love,
mom