Bring on the fireworks

Before I start, I forgot to mention that I was surprised the world had not ended when we came home from camping because the unbelievable happened last weekend. For the first time in almost four years of playing together, I beat Kevin at Scrabble.

Four years, people! It took me four years to beat him!

And even then, I only beat him by 2 points but still, victory was sweet. When I told Leslie (one of our bowling teammates) about it, she said "Four years? Man, I would have stopped playing with him a long time ago." And yeah, it's frustrating but I usually beat him at Uno for some reason and Yahtzee's almost always a draw, so it's cool. Besides, I beat him with 3 30+ triple word score plays, which is more awesome than I can tell you.

Anyway, the real reason I am writing is because of Star Jones. Yes, Star freakin' Jones. I'm blaming her for the fact that last night I was so riled up that I almost punched a woman I don't know right in the nose. See, since stupid Star Jones and her alien head have been everywhere this week, she of course popped up in conversation during the second night of my MS Access class last night. And along the line someone mentioned Rosie O'Donnell joining the show. And that prompted the bitchcow in the front row with the stupid haircut to say "Well, now that Rosie O'Donnell's going to be on the show, it's going to be all about gay rights all the time."

Now, maybe if she hadn't said it in the same tone of voice as I would have said "It's going to be all about shit on the bottom of her shoe" then I wouldn't have wanted to punch her in the nose. I'm sure she would have said something else to piss me off eventually though, since anyone who would wear jeans that have been cuffed up to the knee and then bedazzled all over the cuff would surely say something else that would piss me off. But since I was technically in a work setting, I settled for saying "Oh GOD FORBID!" just loud enough for one or two people to hear me.

Fucking bitch.

In other news, my weekend should rock. My mother in law (she of the porn audition and job offers from pimps)is coming into town tomorrow and has promised us dinner at Jake's (which, coincidentally enough, is where Shmouse's brother works). Sunday we're going to the zoo and Tuesday is the annual 4th of July cookout and fireworks at Casa De Moms, which we are sneakily turning into an annual party by adding more guests this year. What better way to celebrate our country's independence than barbecuing with lesbians? On top of all that, Monday night is an alcoholic girls' night out with Beth, Shmouse and Laura, so woo fuckin' hoo.

So have a good weekend, ma peeps. Don't drink and drive, don't talk to strangers, and don't do anything I wouldn't do (which really leaves you a LOT of leeway).

Mountain tales

Back when we were registering for wedding gifts, I dragged Kevin over to the outdoor section of Target and declared that we needed to register for camping equipment.

"But we never go camping!" he said.

"Because we don't have camping equipment, duh!" I argued. And since he still lets me win a lot of our arguments, we registered for a ton of camping equipment. Also, we have awesome friends who like to buy us cool stuff we got pretty much all of the camping stuff we registered for....a cool tent, a great little stove and lantern, an air mattress and pump, cookware, a cooler. Pretty much everything and more that we would need for a decent weekend in the mountains. We added in some new captain's chairs and bedding for the air mattress and we were all set.

Not that we had time to go camping, what with classes and bowling and family obligations and so on and so forth. So we took everything to the storage unit and left it there until I decided it was high time to get our asses up to the mountain. Kevin was in charge of going to the storage unit to pick everything up, and I was in charge of planning the food and making the site reservation.

We headed up the mountain on Friday afternoon, looking forward to a weekend of nature and not much else.


Now, I never looked that closely at the pile of stuff that Kevin picked up and stashed in the trunk. And it's not like we had a list of stuff set aside for him to pick up. So really, it's not a surprise that we got all the way up the mountain and started unpacking only to realize that the air mattress was not there. And my prissy ass is too old to be sleeping on the hard ground. And so yes, Kevin drove back to the storage unit to get the air mattress, hour long drive be damned.

It was only AFTER he had left that I realized that we also did not have the comforter that would be providing sweet comfortable warmth for us that night. And my cell phone had zero coverage in the middle of the Cleveland National Forest (go figure). So I stayed there and hoped that he would notice it in the storage unit.

He returned bearing the air mattress...and the cookware, thank goodness. I asked him about the comforter, and yes, he'd seen it. He'd seen it and thought "Eh, it's hot this weekend and we've got the sheets so we'll be fine." Famous last words, right?


Yeah, it was warm all day and most of the night, but about an hour after we went to sleep, we were both rhivering because hello, it gets DAMN COLD at 6000 feet, even in the middle of the summer. I was reading The Devil Wears PRada right before sleeping and it was so cold I was have the frozen version of fever dreams about Meryl Streep as an evil supervillain. I woke up around 3 and had to hike over to the bathroom, which warmed me up at last. I practically ran back to the tent to get as warm as possible before diving back into bed and fall asleep before I got cold again.

I think we both got maybe 4 hours of actual sleep on Friday night. Needless to say, Staurday morning found us hustling over to the local store hoping to find a blanket or sleeping bag or SOMETHING because hell if we were sleeping in the cold again. (And some citronella candles because the DAMN BUGS were freaking us out.)

And then we went for a hike, saw some squirrels, and spent the rest of the day reading and napping. Once we had that sleeping bag in hand, the weekend started looking way up.


We figure this past weekend was just our test run. It had been years since either of us had gone camping, but at least now we both know what not to forget (ahem). And also, I highly recommend hiding out in the mountains for a weekend at least every so often because seriously, the disconnection is blissful, even if it did turn me into a total misanthrope for the next 48 hours.

Seriously, I did not want to be around ANYONE until late today. I hated everyone because it was too noisy and annoying back in civilization. Apparently, I secretly wish I could live in a tent on the mountain all the time.

Except not without showers, because showers are awesome.

My mom is still the best mom ever

Happiest Baby Ever
Originally uploaded by Minarae.

My mom was a month away from the age of 26 when she had me. At the time, she had no idea that she would be a single mother by the time she was 30. All she knew was that she was glad to finally give birth to me since I was three weeks overdue. At first, the doctors thought they had miscalculated the due date, but at 9 pounds, 9 ounces and 23 inches long, I was pretty much a month old baby the day I was born. I was fair, with a head full of blonde hair that never fell out and blue eyes that never did change. She got to spend her first few months of motherhood reassuring people that yes, I was her child since both she and my father had dark eyes and hair and olive skin that did not match mine. She gave birth to a genetic anamoly, which should have been her first clue about the kind of trouble I would be.

When I went to preschool, my mom ended up being one of the teachers there. She loved being with the kids, I think. And I know she loved teaching. When my father left, she had to stop teaching preschool because that was not going to pay the bills for us. Right away, she went and signed us up for welfare and Medi-Cal (I was a clumsy child and she could not afford to leave me without insurance); within a month she was able to go back to the welfare office and tell the guy she'd found a job (with insurance!) at a hospital and would no longer need it. The man told her that he had never seen someone get off of welfare so quickly.

Years later she started going to night school to get her credential, but ended up quitting when she realized that she would have to take a year off of work to do her student teaching. She couldn't afford to do that and still take care of me, so instead she kept working. She's been working at the same hospital ever since she got that first job, and there are people she works with who have known me for most of my life. Her boss was at my wedding, and he remembers me as a 6 year old.

We were really not rolling in the dough when I was a kid, but my mom always made sure I had what I needed and then some. Music lessons, horseback riding lessons, Girl Scout camp every summer, the newest cool toy, a car to drive when I was 16...I got it all, really. The car wasn't brand new and sometimes I would have to work for the new cool toy, but I never felt like we were any worse off than any of my friends.

I got a D in trig in high school and I have never seen her so mad; the next semester I got an A in pre-calc just to make sure she wouldn't stay mad. When I went to USC, we discovered that the mortgage she held on a condo that she rented out helped me qualify for more financial aid, so she took it back off the market and didn't sell it until I graduated. She was the first person I called when Todd broke up with me and moved out, and she rented the truck to move me out of that apartment. The day I broke my ankle, I couldn't find her when I called because she was off getting a check for my rent so that I wouldn't get evicted. I still call her when I'm sick or upset or just haven't talked to her for awhile. She lives 15 minutes away from me and we see her at least once a month, but I still miss her sometimes.

We fought a lot when I was a kid. I think we fought every single morning my junior year in high school. I was stubborn and a pain in the ass and entirely too smart for my own good. I drove her as crazy as she drove me. Adulthood did wonders for our relationship, I have to say. I'm incredibly blessed to be able to call my mom my friend. Everyone loves my mom. Seriously, if you asked any of my friends about my mom, they would all tell you how much they love her. But none of them love her quite as much as I do.

And today's her 57th birthday. She's had an awfully full life, but she's got a lot of adventures still waiting to happen.

Happy birthday, Mom. I love you, always and forever, amen.

Because I am bored and not feeling the cleverest

How lame am I? So lame that in lieu of something witty and clever, I'm going to fill this space with a discussion of the referral hits my blog has gotten lately. Take for instance my favorite repeat offender...."custard boobs".

"Custard boobs", indeed.

I'm not sure what's being searched for here. Is there some secret fetish fout there that involves boobs being covered in pudding? Or was this search generated by a need to see some boobs sculpted out of custard? Or perhaps this person fantasizes about licking custard off boobs? Or maybe, just maybe, it's the name of a delectable treat not known in this country, because this search is alwyas done on GoogleUK. Always. And repeatedly. Would someone care to explain the apparent British obsession with the phrase "custard boobs" to me? Or is this one of those things that is never discussed? And if you are the person who gets here by searching for "custard boobs", let me know. I'm dying of curiosity here.

Next up: "peeing when wearing a kilt"

I would like it noted for the record that somehow I come up #5 on this search, despite the fact that I never spoke about Kevin's urination practices in his kilt on here. And U never asked him either. I just assumed he flipped it up and did his thing. Seriously, is it so difficult that you need to look up instructions on the internet? (Also, it looks like it was someone searching on Swedish Google for this one, which leaves me wondering if it's even warm enough to wear a kilt in Sweden.)

How about this one: "inhaling antifreeze"

Okay, this one and variations on it shows up on a regular basis too and dude, STOP SEARCHING FOR IT! Inhaling antifreeze is bad and can harm your brain cells and KILL YOU. Enough said.

Hey now! "zoot designs blogger template"

Go over there. That's the page that has what you're looking for. All you'll find here is a shining example of how to use her fabulous free templates.

Oh dear, person who searched for "44ddd"....I hope you were just trying desperately to find a bra and not looking for big boobies. Although it does look like that search would get you both. I am especially amused to find out that I am listed on the same page as the New York Stocking Exchange, a site name that cracks me up. And just for the record, yes, I am somewhere between 44DD & 44DDD. It's not an accomplishment and I'm not showing them to anyone on here. Although boobs do seem to be a good way to get referrals, don't they?

But this one is my new all time favorite: "crappy dinners for people who take me for granted".

That is one unhappy person who searched for that. I'm thinking it was a mom whose kids and husband forgot her birthday and instead spent the day demanding that she give them rides and cook them dinner. I hope she made something truly horrible for them. Maybe I'll try and find some recipes that could help her out. Or just send her the link to those Weight Watchers recipe cards that I saw on poundy.com. Now THOSE would be some truly crappy dinners.

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Sunday is Father's Day, which means we will be having lunch with The Father In Law and His Wacky Wife.

I think I'll start drinking tonight to make sure I'm good and ready for that. Hey, at least it should make for a good blog entry!

Happy Friday, indeed.

This, that and the other

You know what is really just too awesome for words? What is too awesome for words is getting drunken text messages from one of your Friends On The Intarweb. But there's something even more awesome than that, and that is having the drunken text message followed by a drunken phone call from the same person. It really livens up a boring Saturday night at home, I have to say.

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I made this mac and cheese recipe tonight for dinner. First of all, it makes a metric butt-ton of mac and cheese. Secondly, it is freakin' good. But next time I think I'm going to make it with sharp cheddar and a smidge less Dijon mustard. But it's creamy and saucy and amazingly low in Points considering how much we got to eat of it. 1 1/2 cups is actually a lot of macaroni and cheese, you know? So those of you who are looking for comfort food that doesn't cause your jeans to stop being comfortable, give it a try.

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Okay, my nose is driving me nuts tonight. I don't know if I ate something tonight that I'm oddly allergic to or what, but my nose feels like my sinuses are twitching inside. I'm sitting here trying to type and I keep thinking I must look like Samantha Stevens trying to twitch away her nosy neighbor. I'm sure that it'll look great for me to go to work tomorrow and constantly be rubbing my nose.

Speaking of work, I basically spent all day arguing with people today, which is always a good time. At one point my boss and I were discussing yet another corporate procedure that really is entirely lame in its stupidity, and he was bitching at me about it. I finally just threw my hands up and told him that it wasn't my policy and I couldn't change it so no more bitching at me because it wasn't in my job description. Luckily, he was in a good enough mood that he didn't mind me giving him a healthy dose of crap.

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Today I stopped by PetSmart to pick up some cat litter only to find out that there had been some crazy, tragic accident at their distribution center so there hadn't been any deliveries lately. When the friendly store lady told me that, I had a sudden image of someone losing a hand or a foot or some other limb in a tragic accident involving packages of pine bedding and dog food. I got over that visual pretty quickly because what really mattered was that there was no more Swheat Scoop on the shelves. There was another woman standing there looking for the same thing, so we asked the woman what we could get that was similar to our beloved Swheat Scoop, the litter made from wheat that conquers all odors and clumps like you wouldn't believe. It is awesome despite its stupid, stupid name.

Well, we had two options. One was a gigantic bag of something that cost like $25. The other was the Nature's Miracle litter, which was a lovely $9. I'd heard the woman mutter behind me about the cost of the first littler the saleslady showed us, so when I saw that there was only one bag of the Nature's Miracle Stuff left, I did what any self-respecting penny pincher would do.

I snagged that last bag and walked away six kinds of happy.

Now, my cats are oddly easy going when it comes to their litter. I could change types on a weekly basis and the little suckers wouldn't even notice. So I came home, cleaned the littler box out, and dumped the fresh litter right in. Which is when I noticed that the litter smells like...a forest. Seriously, it was like someone chopped down a bunch of trees and dumped the mulch in my kitchen. Wackiness.

But they've both used it and I smell nothing but forest so I guess it works. We'll see how long it sticks around though. I do love me some Swheat Scoop.

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Did I ever show you guys our wedding pictures? NO? Okay then, you can go here and see the slideshow they put together for us.

We are of course all kinds of in love with all of them, which makes me very glad that we decided to get two sets of the printed proofs because lord above, the prints would be expensive if we wanted to buy them all. Luckily, we're patient so most of our reprints will be done once we get the digital negatives on our one year anniversary.

Of course, we are going to buy a few bigger prints to get them professionally touched up and such, a couple 8x10s and an 11x14, but now I'm wondering where to hang giant pictures of us. Is it weird to have big old wedding pictures in our living room? I hope not because that's really the only place they'll fit. I only have wall space in the bathroom and the living room.

And no one needs to see giant pictures of us while peeing.

If laughter keeps a person young, we'll never be old

Life with my husband is a secret treasure trove of funny stories. Seriously. Like the other day, when Kevin and I went out to dinner (bacon cheddar burger for him and a Gardenburger for me; one guess as to which one of us is on a diet). I noticed he had a Band-Aid on his finger, so I did what any good wife would do; I asked him what happened to make him all bleedy.

"well," he said, "they moved all our cubicles today. And our IT people decided to just plug things in without arranging the cords well, so there were cords hanging everywhere. But there's these holes cut into the cubes where you can feed cords through so it's not a mess. So I rearranged all my cords into the holes."

"Mmhmm," I replied, thinking that maybe the cord cut his finger or something. But no, that wasn't it.

"So then Sheila noticed that I had done that to my cords, and she asked me to come do the same thing for her. I went over to move her cords, and for some reason the IT people had put her phone cord between the edge of the desk and the wall of the cube so it was stuck in there. I was trying to push the wall back some so I could move her cord over with the rest of them when my finger slipped. And it hit a plastic cover thing and cut my finger."

That's when I started laughing. One question and one answer and I was halfway done with my meal.

See, Kevin has this problem. He cannot for the life of him not answer questions without an elaborate story. Ever. For him, there is no such thing as Point A to Point B. There is only Point A to Point T to Point Y to Point M to Point F to Point B, with a quick stop off at Appendices C, G, and X. This story was a perfect example of that little problem. If the roles had been reversed and it was my finger that was covered in a Band-Aid it would have gone something like this:

Kevin: "What happened to your finger?"
Me: "Oh, I was trying to move Sheila's phone for her and I cut it on a piece of plastic."
Kevin: "Ouch!"

And then we would have gone on about our meal. Instead we had the Dramatic Reenactment followed by Hilarious Discussion about one of my husband's more amusing quirks.

Now here's the thing. It's not just stories that get told this way. He can't give simple directions either. The next day, we were going to the zoo with Arianne and she was going to come to our house. Instead of telling her to get on the 805 and go up the hill, it became "Okay, go from the 8 goes past the 163 and two big malls, then to the 805. When you get on the 805, it goes up because it goes from canyon to canyon..."

I was in the other room getting ready, which is the only reason it wasn't me giving the directions, and when I heard that start, I hollered to him just tell her how to get here because by the time he finished describing the 805 she'd be in Mexico.

You should see the difference between our versions of how we met.

Mine: "We both had journals on Diary-X and I randomly found him through one of my friend's projects. I commented on his guestbook, he emailed me, and we met in person three months later. Been together ever since."

His: "Well, back in 2002 I had just broken up with my girlfriend......blah blah blah.......started a journal of my own.....was reveling in being single since I really never had been.......blah blah blah......went ahead and participated in Interviewed......blah blah blah.......came down to San Diego and met her....blah blah blah....moved down to San Diego....blah blah blah....asked her to marry me....blah blah blah....got married last year. And that's how we met!"

Okay, maybe that's a slight exaggeration, but it's close, I swear.

Don't get me wrong. I love his long, roundabout stories. It's how he is. He talks the way he drives when we're not in a hurry....different routes than usual, with different scenery.

But even though it's cute, I still get to laugh at him about it. That's the way we roll. I laugh at him, he laughs at me. It's a good time for everyone!

Wait til I tell you someday about his narration skills. Those are even funnier.