I’m leavin’ on a jet plane…

Don’t know when I’ll be back again*.

Ok, that’s a lie.  I DO know when I’ll be back again, Department of Labor.  And it’s well before any potential employer would offer me a job.  In other words: I’m all present and accounted for.  No need to keep looking at me suspiciously.  Move along.

As for the rest of youse – fair warning.  I wanted to let you know I’ll be maintaining radio silence for a few days.  I know, I know!  I’m all frowny-faced about it too!!

Until we meet again, I leave you with a few erudite airport observations (that’s alliteration for ya!):

  • Yes!  Stay at home mothers DO get frickin’ vacations so SCREW YOU!  But thanks for asking.
  • Why does the airport contain the most children-who-sound-like-monkies?!?  I mean, seriously, they could be arranging a traveler ambush from the tree tops for all we know ’cause there are THAT many of them!
  • How do ALL the annoying, slow-moving people spontaneously find eachother at the same time?!? Thus creating vortexes (vortices?) through which you may not pass?
  • Here’s a little tip: STAND RIGHT, WALK LEFT ya bleeping’ morons!!!
  • The word is ‘deplaning’ NOT ‘deboarding’.  ‘Deboarding’ makes no sense.  Are you confusing it with ‘debarking’?  Which starts to sound weird if you say it too many times.
  • Stop the friendly chit-chat.  I don’t like people, which means I don’t like their friendly chit-chat.  So stop already!
  • When the doors are closed, the doors are closed.  No amount of blood, sweat or tears will open them again.  I see this as a metaphor for life in general.
  • Why do I always get soooo sleepy right before a plane takes off.  Are the airlines secretly gassing us to keep us docile?!?  ZZZZzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz

 

*Speaking of leaving on jet planes, did anyone else’s kindergarten teacher named Mr. McAllister at Split Rock School in upstate New York tell them that HE wrote that song??  If so were you as disappointed as I was when you found out some schmoe with moon glasses named John Denver actually wrote it??

How to become a Jedi Knight

I was cleaning out the car today…and found a Star Wars Mad Libs book!  Methinks we’ve got a blog THEME going here this week.  Tomorrow perhaps I’ll share with you the little known lyrics to the Star Wars song (hint: most people think the song is only instrumental – except for my husband and son, they know different).

Until then, I will leave you with the following information on…

How to become a Jedi Knight

[The following is so funny you might forget to laugh.  Just like I did.  Oh.  And for the record?  It was completed by 9 and 10 year olds in case you couldn’t tell.]

Want to be a Jedi POOP?  Follow these STINKY steps:

  1. Find a Jedi Master: In order to become a POOPY Jedi, a young Padawan, or Jedi apprentice, needs to learn from someone who has FAST mastered his or her training.  Perhaps Master TEDDY [the family dog] is available. 
  2. Study the ways of the Force: It takes a lot of SMELLY patience and belief in the TOOTS around you, but a Padawan must understand the Force before he or she can really practice the ways of the Jedi BELLYBUTTON.
  3. Make your own light-BUTTCRACK: Find special BUTT CHEEKS to place in your lightsaber’s MOLE.  Then, commune with the Force to make it PEE.
  4. Listen SLOWLY: Finally, and most HIGHLY, do as the older and wiser Jedi BOOGERS tell you — even if they want you to COOK QUICKLY!

We are the champions (Part 2)

My doubles partner & I won our tennis match last night!

I thought my first win was a fluke (well, that…and the other team was DRUNK).  But after yet ANOTHER win?!?  Methinks some mad tennis skillzzz lurk beneath this mild-mannered Home Mom exterior.  (Home Mom in the house!  Wha-up, wha-up!!)

Full confession though: one of the chicks on the other team is a hospice nurse and came straight from work.  While she brought a change of tennis clothes, she had forgotten her court shoes.  But since she’s a HOSPICE NURSE, far be it from me to say anything negative about her.  In fact, she was really quite fun and lovely, but she ended up playing the entire match IN HER WORK SHOES!

And her partner?  Kept holding out her hand every time we changed sides-of-the-court to show us how shaky she was.  Apparently she was in the midst of a hypoglycemic attack.  She mentioned several times how she should have eaten before the match.  In all fairness we DID ask if she wanted to stop the match so she could eat some faux fruit gummies.  But she was content to bull through it.  So we accommodated her by opening up a fresh can of whoop-a$$; Within the hour we beat the pants off Shaky McGee and Nurse Shoes McGoo.

Mad skillzzz??  Or the perfect storm of inappropriate shoes and bad eating habits?!?

Who cares!  I’m not proud.  I’ll take the win any way I can get it.

May the force be with you

Have you seen the car decals with the stick-figure families on them?  Usually they display the likes/interests of each person in the family.  For example, the father is holding a fishing pole, the mom is talking on a cellphone and carrying a brief case, the boy is wearing a ball cap and holding a bat, the girl is dressed in a tu-tu and ballet shoes.  Lined up beside the ballerina are two regular cats and one cat-with-wings indicating the family currently has two living cats and one deceased cat.

Can I get a big groan and eye-roll right about now?  Especially for the cat line-up?!?

Thank you.

As if those stick-figure decals aren’t bad enough…yesterday Hubby and I spotted THE WORST one of all time, space, galaxies and black holes.  When Hubby first saw it, he spontaneously erupted with, “Good Lord!  That is nerdy as hell!!!”

Any guesses on what it was?

It was a family line-up symbolized by Star Wars characters.

There was Darth Vader, Lady Darth Vader (Queen Vader??), Luke Skywalker, Princess Leia and R2D2.

The Top 5 unanswered questions for me at this point would be:

  1. How does something like this go down?  Does the Dad give a Star Wars family decal to the Mom for Mother’s Day?  Does the Mom give it to the Dad for his birthday??  Is the whole FAMILY in on it, or just the parents?
  2. Speaking of the parents, did they meet at that big, annual, Sci-Fi nerdfest in L.A. and it’s been true love ever since but their kids think they’re hopeless dorks and are forced to cringe and duck every time they get into the Death Star-mobile-with-the-Star-Wars-family-decal-on-the-back??
  3. Does the father in this family REALLY picture himself as Darth Vader?  In which case he must be the meanest, heaviest breathin’ Dad in the land.  He will cut your hand off without a backwards glance.
  4. And WHO is the Lady Vader chick all-dressed-in-white?  If you’re going down the path of representing yourself as a Star Wars character, at least make it REAL Star Wars character.  Because made-up characters just compound the nerd-error.  Unless I’m in WAY over my head and have just revealed my Star Wars ignorance because there actually IS a Queen Vader??  And if you know the answer to this question, you must be part of this Star Wars family because you’re a DORK!
  5. And really, how shitty does the youngest person in this family feel being represented by a short, squat robot??  ‘Cause let’s face it – R2D2 is NOT the high-end, gold robot with the lovely English accent.  He’s the wacky, comic-relief robot.  Hubby insists that R2D2 is meant to represent the family dog.  I insist that either they have a new baby which makes only zany beep-boop noises.  OR?  A family like this may actually HAVE a robot.

So many questions.  So little time.  Who knows the answers?

Obi-Wan Kenobi…Do YOU know??!

Help me, Obi-Wan Kenobi.  You’re my only hope.

Checkity, check, check!

Do you remember that Hamburger Helper slogan: Hamburger Helper helps the hamburger help HER make a great meal.

Well I say BARF to all of it!  Hamburger Helper AND their slogan.

While I long to go back to the days of yore when moms had nothing else to do but make great meals, that ship has sailed and moms have to do all that mom stuff AND work outside the home.

But I’m getting off track from my original point which is…the one time I had Hamburger Helper, it tasted like barf.  And to complicate things, I think their old slogan from the 80’s was totally misogynistic.  And so on principal, I won’t buy the stuff now that I have nothing to do but make great meals (I’m TRYING to get a job, so screw you).

And did you know?  The word misogynistic is one of the words I use that my husband HATES.  (Yes, I sometimes use it in casual conversation.  Trust me.  There are plenty of reasons it comes up.  Hamburger Helper and their rat-bastard 80’s slogan for one.)

And since we’re on the topic, I’ll share with you the other words I use that he hates.  In no particular order, they are:

2)Discordant.  I usually use this when referring to annoying Lynyrd Skynyrd crap music he listens to where they go off on tangential guitar riffs and the whole discordant mess makes me want to claw my ears off.

3)Strident.  I’m not sure it’s the actual WORD he hates.  But my voice BEING strident?  Totally.  Because I can make my strident voice sound eerily like my mother’s strident voice when calling his name.  Naturally, I use this to good effect when I need something.  Say Hubby and I are in a crowded bar and I need him to get me a drink.  I make my voice sound as much like my mother’s as possible when I speak his name stridently over everyone’s head.  This immediately gets his attention and I get my beer!  Win/Win.  Hi Mom!

Ok…so…there are three most-hated words.  And then there are three most-hated phrases, which are:

1)Fixin’s.  I’m not sure this is actually a phrase, but Hubby insists it is.  Fixin’s is typically used in conjunction with dinner plans wherein I might say something like, “I have fixin’s for tacos so that’s what we’re having for dinner.  No, we can’t use the meat to make burgers on the grill ’cause I don’t have any other fixin’s for burgers.”

2)Tips n’ Tricks.  It’s just what it sounds like – insider information or helpful hints based on someone else’s lessons-learned.  My friend from Australia claims this isn’t actually a real U.S. saying; that I just made it up.  But I beg to differ.  It can be used in a multitude of ways for a variety of reasons.  For example: “Hey Department of Labor.  My job search doesn’t seem to be going so well.  Do you have any tips n’ tricks you can share with me for finding employment comparable to what I had this time last year??”

And the third phrase?  See if you can pick it out from the following example: This has been a good blog post, hasn’t it?  Fun?  Check.  Too much information??  Check.  All done???  CHECKITY, CHECK, CHECK!!! 

The Shirt Off My Back

I got a call from a recruiter.  She wanted me to come downtown and take a test for a job her company was considering me for.

The potential job was an hour commute EACH WAY via public transportation (and 8 bucks I might add).  And it paid $25,000 less than the last job I had.

Hmmmmm….

Me no like-y any of it.

And when I expressed my doubts to Hubby about not wanting to go to the testing, much less even wanting the JOB, he replied, “If you really don’t want the job, then wear a shirt to the testing that says: WILL STRIP FOR BEER.”

ME:  “Great plan, Sweetie!  But what if they call my bluff by handing me a Coors Light at the testing door?”

HIM:  “Tell them that it isn’t actually your shirt.  Tell them it’s your sister’s shirt and that you lost YOUR shirt at the bar last night.”

To the Potential Employer Who Made Me Do Testing the Likes of Which I Haven’t Seen Since I Graduated from College and Temp Agencies Made Me Take TYPING Tests:  This isn’t MY shirt!  It’s my sister’s.  I lost MY shirt at the bar last night!!!

Twinkies

They have made a comeback which Hostess* is touting as the sweetest in the world.  Saved from the brink of extinction – Twinkies  are baaaaAAAACK!

But should they be?!?

I walked into Wal-Mart the other day & there was a huge stand of them RIGHT THERE.   Thinking my children had never had them and it might be a fun novelty to try, I bought a box.  [I know.  I know.  I’m an End-cap Marketers dream-come-true.]

When I got home, it turned out the kids HAVE had them before.  [When?  How??  NEVER on my watch – that’s for dang sure!]  And they LOVE them!!!

Really, what’s NOT to love??  A yellow, cream-filled sponge cake that tastes like….a sponge, fresh out of the package-which-has-kept-it-oddly-moist-until-now.  In fact, that’s how they make Twinkies.  They take a fresh sponge, remove the green scrubber top, form the remaining yellow-ness into a shape that does not naturally occur in nature, and fill it with sweetened shortening.

Yes.  This is absolutely how they make Twinkies.

I AM NOT MAKING THIS UP!!

They also include a fun…er…ingredient called sodium acid pyrophosphate which has the added benefit of making your tongue tingle (burn?  itch??) in an uncomfortable way when you eat a Twinkie.

In fact, with all the many other fun…er…ingredients they contain, Twinkies can actually stay fresh long after a nuclear holocaust has occurred (take note, Doomsday Preppers.  You’ll want these for your dessert stash).   And if you’re lost in the woods, you can start a fire with them.  [I know my Latin.  And ‘pyro’ – as in sodium acid PYROphosphate – is derived from the word ‘pyromaniacs’ who are people who like to start fires when they’re lost in the woods.]

In summation, Twinkies are a shining example of American know-how and ingenuity; Free market economics at its best.  They are a nutritious, tasty treat for people of all ages and walks of life.

Well.  Perfect for everyone except Vegetarians, that is.  Because Twinkies contain beef fat.  Who would have guessed?!

Yum** – please pass me another!

 

*As a side note, does anyone else think ‘Hostess’ is a dumb, outdated name for a company?!?  It also starts to sound weird if you say it too many times in a row.

**When I say “Yum!” I really mean, “Why does my tongue burn and itch – and why are the taste buds actually JUMPING out of my mouth?!?”

Get Lucky

Have you heard this new song by Daft Punk called “Get Lucky”?   Most of the lyrics go like this:

We’re up all night to get lucky
We’re up all night to get lucky
We’re up all night to get lucky
We’re up all night to get lucky

Then there are some lyrics that go like this:

We’re up all night ’til the sun
We’re up all night to get SARS (Yes, you will get SARS – but more likely mono – if you stay up night after night to get lucky.)
We’re up all night for good fun
We’re up all night to get lucky

And then we’re right back to being up all night to get lucky.  Endlessly up all night.  Endlessly trying to get lucky.  Nope.  Still up.  Still not lucky.   And still up……….

In essence, the song is repetitive and mind-numbing.

And this brings me to my point: Back in the ’80’s – we had WAY better songs!  Lyrics really MEANT something.  Serious life and death issues (not just SAR’s) were covered by many famous artists.  “Girls just wanna have fun?”  Why, yes!  Yes we do!  And how ’bout, “We got the beat!”  Why, yes.  Yes we do!

See?  Super serious stuff.

And what about the artist names?  Madonna, The Bangles, U2, Prince, The Police, THE GO-GO’S?  Need I go on?!?  If you got the beat, then you get the point.  Those were some quality rock group names.

Daft Punk??  It sounds like some thug from a Warner Brothers cartoon.

Pssst!  Daft Punk, here’s a message for you…go to bed already.  You’re not gonna get lucky with this 80’s girl.  She has her standards.  Better yet, I’LL go to bed already.  Even though I like to have fun, I really need my beauty sleep.

Wahl Deluxe Complete Haircutting Kit (an update)

Remember that blog where I bought the Wahl Deluxe Complete Haircutting Kit at Costco so as to save money by cutting my son’s, husband’s and dog’s hair?

Well, that plan has been a resounding success!

Sort of.

Ok.  Not at all.

The Boy:  My son’s hair looked like (in his own words) a “muffin top” after I got done with him.  I explained to him what a muffin top actually means to the majority of the world, but I did have to agree that his hair was oddly poofy on top and in the bang area.  This had the unfortunate side-effect of making him look kinda muffin-y up there.  Which necessitated two more trims after the first one.  And I’m not even gonna mention anything about the human hair that was spread all over the backyard afterwards (that’s where I cut Sonny’s hair.  On a stool.  In the back yard.  On a drop cloth.  Where else was I supposed to do it?  The kid has a LOT of hair and I didn’t want it in my HOUSE!).  Not only did the human hair accidentally-scattered-by-the-wind-into-all-of the-trees-and-bushes NOT keep the rabbits, prairie dogs and voles away as we had hoped – but it is now hopelessly embedded in the clothing we wore that day, never to come out.

The Husband: Cutting my husband’s hair was a breeze compared to the above.  I took the clippers all the way down to “0” (meaning no attachments, just sharp, angry steel between me and his head).  And afterwards it looked like he had gone to the barber for a $15 head shave!  Admittedly, weird crouching in the shower stall on both our parts was needed to accomplish that look.  I’m pretty sure the barber wouldn’t have done it that way.  Despite the positive results, the negative side effect of that experience was what I’m calling a “hair splinter” that I got in my nose.  Well…actually…not IN my nose.  But ON it.  I took a picture of it because it’s too crazy to be believed.  A tiny piece of hair the size of splinter was actually embedded IN the skin ON my nose.  I had to use squeezing/pinching maneuvers and tweezers to remove it.  No.  I’m totally not kidding.  Who even knew this was possible??

The Dog:  Here are the before and after pictures of the dog’s haircut.  The pics look pretty much the same, don’t they?  Well, except for those few tufts of hair on the grass in the second shot.  That’s about all I was able to get off of him before I gave up.  The instruction booklet never said that sweet, Wheaten Terriers turn into Tasmanian Devils when confronted with clippers.  That sort of stuff should REALLY have been mentioned.  ‘Cause they do.  And he did.  So I gave up in abject terror after he took me AND Sissy down with his fourth double barrel roll.  You know the kind.  They’re the ones alligators use to break their victims’ necks as they are bringing them to the bottom of the pond to die of a broken neck AND drowning before they eat them.  With their sharp, sharp teeth.

So…where does all of this leave me?  I’m out 40 bucks for the haircutting kit.  Sonny looks like Edward Scissorhands got drunk and went medieval on his a$$.  Hubby is more bald than when we started.  And the dog looks like he has a case of mange.  And NOW?  Now I need to shell out another 50 bucks to repair the damage.

Yep.  That went well.  Savin’ money every which way.  Don’t you agree?

We are the champions…

…my friends!  (Freddie Mercury/Queen, 1977 – but close enough to the 80’s to win me two points in the “80’s song for every moment in life” game I play in my head).

And WHY is this song in my head?

Because I won!  I won!  I wonIwonIwonIwonIwon!!!

I won my FIRST tennis match last night: 6-2, 6-2.  How you like ‘DEM apples?? (say it in a New Jersey accent.  It’s funnier that way.)

Of course it helped that the other team was drunk.  Well, one of them was drunk anyway.

After she shows up telling us we mustn’t hit her in the head because she just had Botox, she then proceeds to tell us that her pro suggests she have a little drinkypoo before a match to calm her nerves.  Uh – yeah.  My pro says the same thing.  But my pro DOESN’T encourage me to CONTINUE drinking throughout the match!  And I’m pretty sure hers doesn’t either.

So I didn’t feel as bad as I could have when I hit her ribs below her left boob with the ball during warm-up.  Out loud I said, “Oops!  I’m so sorry!  I thought for sure you’d get that!  But at least it wasn’t in the head per your request!  Tee hee tee hee.”

In my HEAD, it actually went something like this, “Good.  I’m glad I hitchya.  If you can’t protect your own boobs with the tennis racket because you suck so badly AND you’re drunk, you deserve to get hit.  But at least it wasn’t in the head per your request.  Tee hee tee hee.”

I mean, really.  The other team was absolutely awful.  I kept telling my partner that if we didn’t win this game, we were the suckiest tennis players.  Ever!

Come on!  I know I SUCK.  But I don’t want to be the…SUCK-I-EST!   Right??  Who’s with me on this?!?

And my partner didn’t believe that the chick on the other team was drunk…until drunkypoo actually asked, “Ish it my turn to SWERVE again already?!?”  Yes, yes it is.  Funny how that happens.  You have to swerve every fourth turn.

Speaking of swerving, when drunkypoo’s partner was swerving, she made drunkypoo stand almost OUTSIDE the court because she was afraid she might accidentally hit drunkypoo in the head.

Trust me.  I’ve played against Swerver Extraordinaire before and – in addition to seeing her toss the ball up five, six, SEVEN times before swerving – I’ve also actually SEEN HER hit her partner in the head during a swerve.  So it was a good move on her part to put drunkypoo Baby in the Corner.

But in all fairness, they did have good eats and drinks after the match.  So there is that.  AND the conversation about the Medium Parties they’ve hosted and attended was interesting.  So there’s that as well.

Oh.  And also??  I wonwonwonwonwonwonwon!!!!