The other day my friend called me and I was commiserating over how my Aunt Ruby had just arrived for her monthly visit, which usually last 3-4 days depending on her mood, which is frequently grumpy. I wasn't going to getting any tonight.
"Sex is really good for cramps," my friend says.
"Yeah, I know," I say miserly.
"Wait do you guys do it when your Aunt is visiting?" she asks.
"No," I say. "The mere sight of Aunt Ruby is a real turn off for him."
"So how do you know it helps?" she asks.
Right then I abruptly end the phone call with, "I need to go take a shower. I'll call you later, when I'm feeling better."
I'm very olfactory, among other things, I won't mention. I always smell my food before I eat it. I always have.
When my kids are near, I smell them too. I can often tell if they are getting sick, by their breath, which I refer to as "sick breath." I can smell "SB" a mile away.
The other day, as I was writing, Gio climbed into my lap, which he often does. His head was at the level of my nose, so I took a whiff, expecting to smell the sweet fragrance of shampoo. "Eeew!" I exclaim. "His hair smells like Vinny has been spitting in it!"
"That's because he has." says Stefan. "Did he lick his hair, or spit in it?" I ask as if there is a difference. Wait, there is. Spitting is, definitely, worse. I, myself, would much rather have someone lick my hair. I think Vinny has a little bit of dog up in him, because I have caught him licking Gio on many occasions.
"I caught him spitting once," says Stefan. "But if you ask him I am sure he'll deny it. He denied it when I caught him." "Vinny did you lick Gio's hair?" I ask, in denial of the probability of spitting.
"What do you mean?" asks Vinny innocent as a thief.
I have been trying to figure out how to use twitter.com, a microblogging website. It is yet another site devoted to staying in touch with friends. After logging onto Twitter I'm asked, "what are you doing?" This question must be answered in 140 characters or less, slightly shorter than a text message. Updates on Twitter are called tweets.
Obama tweeted a lot up until Nov 5th, but now apparently he hasn't tweeted at all. Hmmmm. I assume his non-tweetiness is due to overprotective secret service people, or perhaps, Obama's campaign was all about marketing effectively. Probably a lot of both. He is a politician, after all. Supposedly, he is working out a deal with security so he can stay wired to his peeps. Otherwise, Generation We may have been Madison Avenued into submission, I mean campaigning and voting.
Where was I? Oh yeah Twitter: microblogging, short messages, that keep your family and friends up to date on how you are really doing. These are similar to the status updates on facebook, except Facebook asks, "what are you doing right now?"
As I was surfing (the surfer in me just vomited) on Twitter I found the button titled Trending topics and Best Buy was under that. Being curious, and remembering reading something about Best Buy giving away free laptops, I clicked on it.
It was 9:30 PM Thursday, the night before Black Friday, and people were already camping out at Best Buy, opens at 5 AM, according to the Twitter tweets. But there was no mention of free laptops in the tweets.
There probably aren't people camping out at my Best Buy, I thought. No, that camping thing is for big cities. Apparently, I live in a big city because there were people camping out at my Best Buy.
"This could be your big break and you neeeeeeeeed good pictures to go with your great writing!" orders my Mom, who doesn't even read my blog, as we drive away from Best Buy with my one blurry picture.
Then my Mom was kind enough to drive to Circuit City on the way because she really wanted me to have a good picture of the campers, albeit they are Circuit City campers.
Her picture is so much better than mine. And she said she asked the lone campers permission.
After checking out Best Buy I searched for some of my friends on Twitter. I couldn't find any of my real friends so I found some of my role models, like Jennifer Nettles. And dooce.com, my favorite mommy blogger and the original inspiration for my own blog. Then I started following them. Following isn't the same as stalking.
Following means when the person I am following tweets the tweet shows up on my Twitter home page in real time, as soon as a tweet is posted. It's a way to stay connected to someone's life, I'm not physically connected to. And if it weren't for the internet perhaps I would never know anyone else struggles with parenting in similar ways that I do.
This whole "we are all connected thing" is really blowing up. Wow.
Not only that, but I'm now following the absent Twitter guy, Mr. President Elect. And guess what? Obama just sent me an email saying he is now following my tweets. OMG! Wait? Does he have time for that?
"Barack Obama is following you?" asks Stefan. "I don't get it?"
"I guess I didn't explain it very well," I say. "It means my tweets show up on his home page in real time."
"Obama is reading you tweets?" Stefans asks in hopeless confusion. It's not like I said he's reading my tits, now that would be confusing.
All this tweeting sounds like a useless waste of time, right? Wrong. Dead wrong. As the terror attacks were happening in Mumbai, people, I'm talking regular people, okay maybe rich regular people, were giving first hand accounts of the terrorist attacks in Mumbai on Twitter. Live news straight from the source. Not filtered through some bleeding heart liberal reporter. I can say that because I am one. Except, I prefer blogger to reporter because that's my sport of preference. Seems as if I am getting back into Journalism as it's about to die. Perfect.
Also, when Motrin released their ad targeted at Mommies, the Mommy blogosphere on twitter was insulted and went beserk. So beserk that Motrin pulled the add and apologized.
Now there is proof of the power of people banding together via the Internet. Together we can make a difference.
Sometimes I wake up in the middle of the night, after just falling asleep, in a panic over the next day's blog.
"What is tomorrow's blog about?" I frantically try to recall. "What deep dark secret will I be revealing tomorrow? Is everyone going to hate me? Or think I'm weird?"
"No. They won't think I'm weird. They already know that. Phew! This whole blog thing is silly. That's it! I'm going to stop this nonsense. No more blogging for me."
Then the next day someone, who I didn't even know was reading my blog, will say something like:
"Oh my gosh. I love your blog. It makes me laugh out loud."
Or:
"Your blog made me laugh so hard I was crying. My husband came into the room to see what was wrong."
Which are so much better than:
"Your blog doesn't have to be funny everyday."
Or:
"Wow, you're such a dork. I can't believe you did that. I still love you, though." I no longer send this person my blog...........................because, she requested I "hold off for awhile."
And it's comments like these that keep me blogging. Well the first two, anyways. I do appreciate the honest feedback, though, sometimes it's hard to swallow, at first. So, whether you really mean it or not, or just feel sorry for me and are trying to be nice. Thank you. Thank you to each and every person who reads my blog and/or says they love it.
Happy Thanksgiving, that is if you celebrate Thanksgiving. Otherwise Happy Thursday!
Lately, I have been thinking if I didn't drink coffee I could be a Mormon. Oh, and I would also have to be Yes on 8, but everyone knows, I'm no on H8. Right???
My stand against prop H8 pretty much ruins my candidacy for being a good Catholic. I often feel like an outsider when I attend my Mom's Catholic functions, but I work through my feelings by being me and being okay with who I am. Which is pretty much what I do wherever I am, anyways.
And I would be a Buddhist if I could be a vegan and abstain from sex. But what fun would that be?
And I could be a JDub (Jehovah's Witness) if I didn't enjoy celebrating holidays. I have thought for a long time, "I Would Die For You" is about Jesus, even if Prince wasn't in the Witness Protection Program back then.
But aside from all those issues my real problem with religion is I would have to be able to listen to what other people tell me to do, think, say and feel. I'm not very good at that. Unless it's someone telling me to go one a wave, but even then I only go if I feel like it. Besides, surfers are notorious for egging fellow surfers into waves, especially bad ones, just to clear the line up, and have all the waves to myself. No, that isn't a typo.
Just ask my Mom. She will say, among other things, I never do what she says. "I still love you, Mom."
Anyways, I can't really lose something I never found in the first place, can I? Or, maybe, in all my searching I made up my own way to connect to my soul........It's called the Church of Surf, where I am at one with all that is.
I don't just save this specialness for the Ocean. No, I take my stoke and share it with the world. Because God, and I'm not talking about an old man with a white beard, lives in every cell of every single being's body no matter what their religion is or isn't. That's my belief anyways. And it works for me.
"Would you like a muffin?" I ask Vinny as we are driving home.
"Yes, please," he answers.
I proudly hand Vinny a muffin, even though I coudn't take a dime of credit for supplying the freshly baked, warm, out of the oven muffins. No, they were given to us. But that didn't stop me from filling up my guilt hole, which gets a little bigger everytime I find myself empty handed while he is starving.
"How many are there?" he asks.
"There were six. Now, there are four," I answer. I was going to wait till we got home to eat one, but the aroma made it impossible.
"I think all the people who are growing in our family should get two. And the people who aren't growing should get one each. So you and Daddy only get one, and Gio and I get two."
"Are you sure Daddy isn't growing because he eats as if he is still growing?" I ask. My husband can eat anything he wants, at all hours of the day and night, without gaining weight.
I, on the other hand, sit next to him innocently while he has a midnight snack which was preceded by a 10 p.m. snack, and my pants get tighter. In fact, just to maintain his body weight he has to eat like that, or he will lose weight. Am I the only one who sees the irony in that?
"You and Daddy aren't growing. I need to keep my strength up. Please, give me another muffin."
"Okay," I say all the while scheming and wondering if he's weaker, will he have less energy to indulge in sibling rivalry with his brother?
Authors Note: Not only has it taken all night to write this blog because it was filled with many distractions including but not limited to getting my kids to fall asleep in the same room, intense phone counseling, Stefan's incessant philosophical chatter and eating. Between the times of 10:15 PM and 11:10 PM he consumed a medium piece of salmon, a two egg omelette, and not one, not two, not three, but four pieces of bread. Then to add insult to injury, he went on and on about how delicious his omelette tasted. Which wouldn't have been so bad if it didn't smell so tantalizing causing my stomach to grumble and my mouth to water.
I'm at home and I reallllllly want an Americano, espresso with water, but I'm too lazy to drive to Starbucks. So instead of drinking my caffeine, I'm just going to have to settle for listening to it right now.
The other day in the car, while Gio and I were on our way to school, Taylor the Latte Boy by Kristen Chenoweth came on.
"Taylor?" asks Gio. "He's in my class! He doesn't work at Starbucks."
"Not that Taylor," I say.
"Oh," he says.
Then we proceeded to listen to "Taylor the Latte Boy" ten more times until we reached our destination. In the classroom, Gio excitedly told his Taylor all about the song. But Taylor had never heard the song, and had no idea what Gio was talking about.
"Yeah, maybe you should get a new Mommy since I'm so mean," I say.
"I'm going to take you back to the Mommy store," he says.
"The Mommy Store?" I ask, never having heard of such a place.
"Yeah, the Mommy Store and I am going to get toys instead," he says clearly informing me of my value.
"Okay, well see you later. I'm going to the Mommy Store, where maybe some other kids will want me," I say.
"No, you're too mean," says Gio.
"Oh, okay, bye then," I say thinking the Mommy Store sounds like a nice place to escape right about now. I wonder if there is a wave pool at the Mommy Store? I've always wanted to surf one.
"No, you have to wait until tomorrow to go," says Gio. "Because Daddy isn't here right now to be with me."
"Really?" I say.
Later that day when my husband was home I tell Gio, "bye I'm going to the Mommy store now."
"Okay, bye," Gio says. "Wait a minute, think I want a Mommy. You're the nicest. Daddy can go to the Daddy Store."
"The Daddy Store," exclaims Stefan. "Where is it?"
"Far, far away," says Gio. "You have to take a rocket ship there." I believe he was referencing our earlier conversation on how to get to Jupiter. So I'm just going to assume the Daddy Store is on Jupiter. Talk about a long distance relationship.
Wondering how my oldest son felt about Gio's return purchase return I ask, "Vinny, can you believe Gio said he wanted to send me back to the Mommy Store?"
"Don't worry, Mom, the Mommy Store isn't a real place," Vinny assures me.
Sometimes we think someone has a crush on us, but in reality they don’t. Maybe the person is just being nice. Or, perhaps, like aura colors create frequency resonation and attraction between people. Recently, I was eavesdropping on some kids, when one of the girls says, “I think Vinny has a crush on me.”
My ears perked up on this note and I quickly joined in on the conversation. “Why do you think he has a crush on you?” I ask.
“Oh, because he always calls me by my nickname,” she answers confidently.
Right then I knew Vinny didn’t have a crush on her, because I knew he thought her nickname was her name. Yes, I had insider information. In fact, I also thought her nickname was the name she went by.
Around the same time I thought the youth minister at Gio’s school had a crush on me. Every time I took Gio to school for the last two years or so, I would say, "hi," as we walked by his tiny office.
Then one day, for no apparent reason, he started coming out of his office when we were going to, and from school. He had never come out of his office before. I didn’t think too much of it till we were leaving one day.
"I don't want to leave, Mommy," complains Gio.
“He can stay, and I’ll go,” offers Youth Minister Guy.
“Ha, ha, ha,” I reply and leave quickly.
What is this guy thinking? Can’t he tell I’m married? Wilco Tango Foxtrot! I even called my friend, in a tiff, to complain about my so called admirer.
From then on, I attempted to avoid him. I wouldn’t even say, “hi,” anymore. I walked on the opposite side of the building from his office and I looked down while doing so. I'll admit he was cute. He had a big violet aura, and I was feeling uncomfortable.
After dropping Gio off at school one day, he came out of his office, and I had nowhere to hide.
“Hey, my name is Andy,” he says offering his hand which I nervously accept. After all, it would have been weird to say, "sorry, I can't shake your hand because I'm married. As in not available."
“My name is Wendy,” I say trying to remember to breathe. Since we shake with our right hand, it would be convenient to also wear our wedding rings on the right hand, now wouldn't it? I feel this would make the "I'm not available," communication more clear without having to come out and say it causing needless embarassment.
“Well, I just wanted to say thanks for saying “hi” to me everyday. This is my last day here. I got a new job as a minister at a big church.”
“Oh good. You shouldn’t be hiding in that lonely, little office, anyways. You need to be inspiring thousands and thousands of people.” Somehow, I refrained from talking about his violet aura, directly anyways.
“Phew,” I thought to myself. The whole time he was just trying to find a way to say "goodbye." And to thank me for saying "hi" to him all this time. And I thought he had a crush on me, and was trying to avoid him. Yes, I was feeling very silly.
Anyways he’s gone off to inspire thousands of people as he should. But sometimes when I walk by his office I pretend he still has a crush on me.
We were on a bike ride and as usual Vinny says, "I have to go to the bathroom." We had just left the house, where he just went to the bathroom. Or at least I told him to go, so we could avoid this very situation.
He is kind of like the opposite of a cat with outdoor privileges that "holds it" till she gets back home to use the litter box. Or maybe he is the same as a male dog, who holds it till he gets outside, where he proceeds to mark his territory.
Fortunately, we were near a room of relief. He went in, while I waited outside.
"Aaaaah!" shouts Vinny.
"What's wrong?" I ask wondering what trauma I will endure today.
"There's a centipede!" he screams back.
"I can handle a mere centipede," I say to myself. Then on second thought I hear a voice in my head ask, "wait, aren't they poisonous?" With trepidation, I go into the bathroom to investigate the creature.
In my pseudo entomologist voice I say, "it doesn't look like a centipede." It didn't look like it had anything close to 100 legs. It had, maybe, 50 legs at the most.
"Well, whatever it is, I'm not touching it," says Vinny. My son is adamantly opposed to pain. Thank goodness. Looks like there won't be any trauma today. Not yet, anyways.
After looking up centipede images on the Internet I came across an image of a millipede, which looked exactly like the critter we saw. Ironically, milli means thousand, but millipedes typically have anywhere from 80 to 400 legs, according to Wikipedia.
I read through the millipede's description and decided this is by far my favorite insect, as they move in a wavelike motion. Now, there's a bug after my own heart.
Today the waves at , "It Smells Like Something Died Because It Did," beach were really fun, with only a few people out. I was sitting in the lineup watching my friend take off on a great wave. Paddling for the horizon, is what I should have been doing because I looked out the back to see a larger wave heading my way.
"Uh oh," said a voice in my head.
I thought I was going to squeak under the beast with my board, but it turns out I was wrong. I ditched my board when I realized the wave was going to break four feet in front of me, while simultaneously saying a prayer for my leash to hold and my board to stay in one piece, please. How do you spell m-u-l-t-i-t-a-s-k-i-n-g?
I wasn't in the mood for the long swim to the beach. I never know if my board will make it to shore or get sucked out to sea in a rip current, never to be seen by my eyes again. I was attached to my board, not just by my leash, but spiritually and emotionally, too.
As I was diving for the sandy bottom, I felt the wave pick me up and toss me like a rag doll.
After going through several rinse cycles I wasn't sure which way was up. I started swimming towards what I thought was the surface, but after several strokes I still hadn't broken the top of the water. I opened my eyes, at the risk of losing my contacts, and it was black. In surfing this is bad, since I can't breathe under water, yet. Breathing underwater is just one of the many Man from Atlantis tricks I've been working on.
I took a few more strokes and finally started to catch sight of light through the water. "Oh joy," I thought to myself, "I'll be sipping air, soon."
As I breached the surface, I gulped in some oxygen and hoped my board didn't fly back and hit me. Surprisingly, there wasn't another wave in sight. There isn't much worse in surfing than being held down by a second wave when I'm already low on oxygen. Happy to skip the two wave hold down treatment, I reeled in my board. It was still tethered to my leg and in one piece. Stoked, I climbed on, and dizzily paddled back out to the line up for more.
Yeah, I'm serious about this whole, "repeal Prop H8" business. 52.1% Californians need to expand their concern for chickens to include p-e-o-p-l-e. The California Supreme Court is most likely going to be making a decision on whether or not to repeal Prop 8 very soon.
While same sex marriage may be against some people's religion, it isn't okay for religions to go around buying legislation that eliminates civil rights for gays and lesbians. Excuse me, but did someone "white out" separation of church and state in the constitution?
So everyone please visualize and repeat this mantra, "equal rights for all of us." People are afraid of what they don't understand. It's time to be brave, let go of fear and let love expand our consciousness.
We want to look good in the history books twenty years from now, don't we? "Yes We Do!" Tomorrow's kids won't look with eyes that discern black from white, or straight from gay, male from female. They're just gonna see aura colors. Think I'm crazy? Time will tell. Besides, look around it's already happening.
It's not the end of the world as fear mongers would have us believe. Rather it's the beginning of a new one. Besides that we seem to be setting an example for the rest of the world. Look how far we've come. Let's take this all the way.
Sometimes, the will of the people dictates the law. I learned this a long time ago, practically in another life in my Constitutional Law class. And we all know sometimes the mob is so wrong.
Prior to election day, I kept thinking to myself, "aren't people protected by the equal protection clause of the 14th amendment?" in regards to Prop 8. Those thoughts were also left over from my Con Law class. I couldn't get myself to look it up until now, but basically my memory served me right, give or take some legal jargon. Here are more of my friend's pictures from the Repeal Prop 8 Rally somewhere in Los Angeles.
I was on Facebook, hanging out with my friends, when I found these pictures posted by someone who goes way back to my high school days. She was Gen We, when Gen We was still in Kindergarten. She always was way a head of her time.
Anyways, her and her husband took their dog to a Repeal Prop 8 Rally in Los Angeles recently. While, my parenting, surfing, and biking hobbies tend to get in the way of my Rally attendance, I almost felt like I was there looking at her pictures.
The rallies across the nation for equal rights for gays are flashbacks to the sixties and the days of civil rights marches. Wow. Here we go again watching herstory happen. The only thing I can think of that would be more exciting is Prop 8 being repealed. Or better yet how about Prop 8 never passing to begin with.
Gio recently graduated to underwear from pull ups. He's very proud he's making less of a carbon footprint on planet Earth, since he no longer contributes to the landfill diaper build up.
Although he insists on wearing underwear backwards because, "the picture goes in the front, Mommy."
Any reasonable person who has ever put their underwear on backwards, knows immediately, their underwear's backwards without looking because it just doesn't feel right. Then again I must be off my rocker thinking a three year old is reasonable, especially this one.
He keeps explaining "the picture goes in the front," to me in exasperation hoping and praying one day I will just get it. Which, ironically is exactly how I feel. However, I am hopeful one day he will get it because his brother went through the same "backwards underwear phase."
"If you put them on that way, it's going to be very uncomfortable. It's going to hurt your butt."
"No, it feels fine," he says.
Obviously, someone without kids designed underwear with the picture on the back. The graphic should be on the front and upside down. Duh!
He loves his underwear so much he changes if frequently, which I'm sure someday will make someone happy. Someone that doesn't have to do his laundry.
He also likes to have a spare pair or two in his hand, much like other children carry around stuffed animals, for comfort and security. And my very favorite is when he wears it on his head with a look on his face that says, "I can't believe no one else has thought of this? Silly, silly fools!" He proudly tells everyone about his underwear, which most strangers find terribly embarrassing.
When we went underwear shopping and were in line making the purchase he announced to Motorcycle Guy behind us, "I just bought underwear!"
"Oh, really........" says Motorcycle Guy, who had totally forgotten how exciting those days were, especially for me.
In line at Trader Joe's, he told twenty-something Check Out guy, "I have underwear on."
Check out guy informs Gio, "that isn't appropriate to be telling people. You really should keep that to yourself." Then Check Out guy rambled on about the inappropriateness of Pirate's Booty in certain contexts.....I think he was playing AM radio in his head. On cue I say, "yeah, stop talking about your underwear. You're embarrassing Mommy."
"What about strangers, honey?" I ask remembering just 4 weeks or so ago the "stranger alert" emails and phone calls I got from Vinny's school. Apparently, a stranger tried to lure a child into his car to "help him with his dog," in very close proximity to Vinny's school.
"No one talks to strangers. And sometimes strangers 'say get in my car'. But I say, 'no and run away'," he says yelling.
"Really?" I say. "Wow."
"Yes, and when the stranger talks to Mommy, Daddy and Vinny he goes to jail."
"Oh," I say.
And then to drive the point home we watched this video, which I personally feel illustrates all the points of the book. Gio even learned all the words, which I surprisingly remembered after all these years. Youtube makes parenting so much easier. I don't know what I'd do without it?
My husband usually wraps all the presents. Not because I don't like wrapping presents, although it's true I really don't enjoy it, but because he's so much better at it than I am. Usually, that is.
Honestly, his wrapping job is so good and straight I think he could get a job in the gift wrap section of a department store during summer break. If the department store manager doesn't read this blog, anyways.
When I was getting ready to leave for the birthday party and saw the present I couldn't help, but ask, "is that some sort of bad joke? Okay. Ha, ha. Now give me the real present."
"That is the real present," he says. "The gifts had an odd shape and that is the best I could make it look."
Well if it looked that bad after he wrapped it, believe it or not, my attempt would have looked much worse. The only difference this time would be I wouldn't be claiming the wrap job as my own.
Yes, I'm in the bathroom taking pictures again. But these were shot while Gio was taking a bath. I also, cleaned the sink and the toilet. What can I say? I am a master multitasker, sometimes.
An anonymous reader, wow I like the sound of the that, left me a comment on, "Toilet Paper Bong" . Actually it was a question. I thought I would answer it with a new blog post because I am desperate for a post today. Oh, and I read that it is a good thing for blog writers to do on blogs.
The question was, "how can you put the toilet paper in backwards?" And the answer can be found in the pictures below, rather than using words to attempt to describe what I meant by backwards, to avoid any further confusion.
By the way, I have changed all the rolls in the house to the "unfun way" and Gio's response was, "Oh, it doesn't work anymore!"
Put roll this way to take all the fun out of a cat's or child's life.
The roll on the right way. Full on frontal shot.
The wrong way to place roll on holder. Side view.
The wrong way to place roll on holder. Full on frontal view.
Is there anything worse than one's own child getting injured while playing? Yes, there is.
I have an informal co-op going with a few of the teachers at Vinny's school. It works great. I watch their kids during staff meetings. They watch my kid in return.
During staff meetings, I typically watch five to six kids. Basically, I spend the entire time scanning the playground for each kid. They tend to move around a lot and don't always play together. When I locate one I move on to the next kid and work through the group. Then I continually repeat the process until their parents arrive.
It was all going well, until the other day. One of the kids fell and hit his head. Unfortunately, it wasn't either of my kids. I would have preferred that.
I was right there when it happened. I don't really know what I could have done to prevent the accident. When it happened, I was on the ground, and he was up on a play structure. A play structure that I felt uncomfortable with before this event. And one I'm sure to have nightmares over now.
When I got to him, there was blood. Lots of blood. So much blood, that when I saw his head I had a very sick feeling in my stomach. I told him, "it's ok head wounds bleed a lot." Although I wasn't sure I believed myself, I tried to sound convincing for his sake. He was crying hysterically, and I was hoping it was the sight of large amounts of blood, rather than pain, that was freaking him out.
In fact, I wanted to cry with him. But I let that go for later, and instead focused on applying pressure to the wound and calming him down. One parent brought me an ice pack and offered to take over. I declined the offer preferring to take responsibility for my charge. No way was I abandoning him in his time of need. Another parent went to get his Dad out of the meeting.
After his Dad came and whisked him away to the doctor for five stitches to his forehead, I got to feel my feelings. They weren't fun, but they were mine. Maybe there are worse things that could have happened, but I couldn't think of any. I felt terrible. I started thinking things like, "wow, life would be so much easier if I just lived in a cave by myself." But then I remembered we're all in this together, for better and worse.
It is awful to watch someone suffer in pain, especially a child. When I went to bed that night, I kept seeing his bloody head flash in my mind. Followed by my neighbor's blue face. Apparently, all trauma gets filed and piled together in my brain.
I started thinking of all the times I had heard about kids getting hurt and thinking whoever was watching them, wasn't watching very closely. Now I was one of those people. It is interesting how judgment always seems to come full circle, especially in parenting.
Anyways, I am signing up for a knitting class so next time I'm in charge everyone will sit in a nice, neat, little, knitting circle. Wait, knitting needles have sharp ends. Those could be dangerous in the hands of boys, especially mine. Wrestlmania!
A few days ago I read an article in the New York Times, citing a study published in Pediatrics, stating kids have less accidents while under the care of grandparents, than under the supervision of their own mother.
Researchers in the study were expecting to find the opposite to be true since grandparents typically don't adhere to modern safety practices. Now there's an understatement. Maybe today's grandparents apply common sense, and many have the benefit of good night's rest. Or could it be the influence of Dr. Spock, "greetings Earthling." Oh wait. Not that Spock, you know the other one. My Mom loves quoting him. Besides it isn't as if it's their first time around the child rearing block. And we're all alive, right?
Of course, there could be other reasons for the finding. Could it be that grandparents keep their grandchildren closer? Maybe they don't let their grandchildren venture into the great outdoors where dangerous things could happen? Or perhaps, Grandparents let kids watch way too much T.V., and play too many video games? The only danger in the last two is attention deficit disorder and repetitive strain injury.
Or maybe grandparents have struck a deal with their grandchildren with a pact no child could resist? "I promise to spoil you senseless, Little Jonny, if you promise not to get hurt while I am watching you. Because if you get hurt on my watch, I will never hear the end of it. Deal?"
The other night my husband and I were computing together.
"So and so just joined Global Orgasm Day (on Facebook)," says Stefan laughing.
"What," I say perking up. My status on Facebook was reading, "Wendy is tired." Not anymore.
"You should join that honey," Stefan says.
I always do what he tells me and I joined. "Hey that was fun," I say. "You should join too," I suggest.
"No, I don't need to put that out there," he quips.
Oh well his loss.
The idea behind Global Orgasm Day (GOD) is during and after orgasm, members should envision world peace. According to GOD, "the goal is to add so much concentrated and high-energy positive input into the energy field of the Earth that it will reduce the current dangerous levels of aggression and violence throughout the world."
They say to do this every 91 days. "What, I don't get it?" says Stefan confused. It didn't make any sense to me either.
Who came up with that number? A yogi? Someone that doesn't really like sex or has a lot of headaches? The number definitely should be every 69 half hours minus 10 hours, which would be about every 24.5 hours. Time for GOD to get a new consultant.
Why not make everyday GOD? Yeah, I can see world peace coming right now. Happy Birthday Stefan!
Last school year one of my parenting friends told me her brother, Eric Burton, was going to be a famous singer. Her kids have since moved to a different school, and I haven't seen her since then. But I wasn't surprised when she sent me an email telling me he was now on Itunes.
I'm Itunes challenged. I couldn't figure out how to open the program without downloading the new updated version, let alone how to listen to his music. I don't like downloading music anyways. Everytime I switch computers or MP3 players it seems as if the music isn't really mine. How can they lock me out of something I paid for? No wonder people download music illegally.
Besides CDs will probably be a thing of the past like albums, 45's, 8 track and cassette tapes. So I am buying CDs while I still can.
I found Burton's CD, "Short Set," on CD Baby. (cdbaby.com.) I was able to listen to a sample of all the songs on the CD. They made me think of Stefan. The sound is acoustic rock with a hint of country that would be nice to play while......ahem...................nevermind.
I like to support artists. Burton seemed to be making the most of his challenges in Earth School: having a daughter with Down Syndrome (listen to Hope's Song) and losing his wife in a car accident in 2005. All songs were written and performed by Burton. Out of his grief and life challenges came his beautiful art.
The Sugarland song playing in my head is, "we all live with the scars we choose. They might hurt like hell, but they all make us stronger."
"CD IN STOCK. ORDER NOW. Will ship immediately," cdbaby promised and they delivered. I had the CD in 2 days! Wow.
I love the CD, and I highly recommend it. I am sharing the email I received after ordering the CD because it's so nice and I felt happy after reading it. I love great customer service and CdBaby is top notch. Now go listen to the samples at this link, please.
Email from CD Baby Your CD has been gently taken from our CD Baby shelves with sterilized contamination-free gloves and placed onto a satin pillow.A team of 50 employees inspected your CD and polished it to make sure it was in the best possible condition before mailing. Our packing specialist from Japan lit a candle and a hush fell over the crowd as he put your CD into the finest gold-lined box that moneycan buy. We all had a wonderful celebration afterwards and the whole party marched down the street to the post office where the entire town of Portland waved "Bon Voyage!" to your package, on its way to you, in our private CD Baby jet on this day, Tuesday, November 4th. I hope you had a wonderful time shopping at CD Baby. We sure did. Your picture is on our wall as "Customer of the Year." We're all exhausted but can't wait for you to come back to CDBABY.COM!!Thank you, thank you, thank you! Sigh...--CD Babythe little store with the best new independent musichttp://cdbaby.com/http://us.mc835.mail.yahoo.com/mc/compose?to=cdbaby@cdbaby.com (503)595-3000
Wasn't that nice?! I love CD Baby! I'm off to the store to buy a frame for my email.
"They didn't eat very much for breakfast," says Stefan referring to the boys Sunday morning appetite.
"Don't worry, they'll be back soon enough for second breakfast," I say. Or at least Vinny will.
"Yeah, they're just like little hobbits," he says. Little hobbits without all the hair. Thank goodness with the cat and the dog there is already too much shedding in the house.
"Does Gio eat very much during the week when I'm at work?" Stefan asks.
"No, he hardly eats anything at all, thank goodness," I say in relief.
"But he's a little guy, he needs food to grow," says Stefan concerned.
"Nope, he only gets a little food to balance out the ravaging appetite of his brother," I say. The most common phrase out of Vinny's mouth is, "I'm hungry," which is frequently followed by, "I'm bored." Early emotional eating?
Even his friend says, "you're never not hungry."
When I first went through Mommy and Me classes with Vinny I couldn't understand why everyone had a food question every class, every week.
I was always bored and tired of hearing the same old, "What should I feed Joey? He only wants chocolate milk and cookies for breakfast, lunch and dinner."
Oh yes, I was beside myself in my food serving superiority with all my organic veggie steaming and grinding my own baby food. I just couldn't figure out what was wrong with those people.
Then Gio showed up and it all became quite clear. Was I being punished for judging those other parents for two years, once a week? Perhaps. But, I soon learned to focus on what he's eating throughout an entire week, rather than say one day. "As long as they eat through the rainbow (color spectrum) of foods for an entire week, they are getting good nutrition," the teacher said.
His eating habits have caused me to lower my own food standards. Now I go to McDonald's and I even like Jack in the Box french fries. They are really good. Y'all should try 'em. Oops. Sorry. But see what I mean?
Two days ago we ate lunch out and Gio convinced me to go to McDonald's for his food. The only item he bothered to eat was the drink. Ten minutes later, he barfed the entire orange juice up while we were at a friend's house. Did I mention this friend doesn't have kids? Luckily we were outside. I'm sad to say I didn't even have the urge to shoot the purge.
"Don't little kids throw up all the time?" she asks.
"No," I say thinking people without kids are really out of touch. However, she quickly reminds me some kids are perpetual pukers(PP) saying, "I threw up all the time when I was a kid." Thankfully my kids are not pukers. Parents of PPs should be awarded extra sleep and alone time or at the very least a house cleaning technician to make up for the extra vomit cleaning. I wonder if parents of PPs were PPs as children?
If there is one thing I have learned from parenting it is to let most things slide, once I have verified through a board certified health professional, there is no harm being done. Most times there isn't. For all the people who say Gio is, "small for his age." There are the same number of people who say, "wow, he's so big for his age." Another thing parenting has taught me is to take what other people say with a grain of salt. Most of the time anyways.
"Can I have cookies for breakfast?" asks Gio.
"What? No. Have you been talking to those other babies, again?"
The scary part is even though I don't let him eat dessert or junk food for breakfast he asks, "can I hold the box?"
Normally I vote based on my political party affiliation, which is Democrat. But I voted for president in 08 solely based on color, but not the color of the candidate's skin. Rather the color of his aura, which is predominantly violet. I am biased since this is also one of my auracolors.
Did someone just ask, "what the heck does that mean?" Barack Obama is a leader with vision, compassion and guess what, he's here to inspire the masses to create a world of peace and equality for all. Whether or not people believe in auras, doesn't really matter because everyone can agree Obama isn't exactly from the good ole boys club.
When violets are in power, they achieve their dream by envisioning the dream in their mind. For violets, seeing is creating. Often times regular folks accuse violets of having lofty unattainable ideals. But violets must hold true to their vision, despite the naysayers.
Obama's vision for the United States includes his intention to heal this country, change the image other countries have of the United States, expand health care, and heal the economic cycle we are currently in. Already the press is saying, "well he may not be able to do that because of blah blah blah and then there is also blah blah blah." Hold the vision, Obama. I mean, "Yes You Can."
Others are saying Obama campaigned on emotional rhetoric and said what he had to to win. A leaders job is to inspire people to do what they came here to do. And Obama did just that. He got people off their couches in record numbers to go vote. And when he talks he seems genuine about what he is saying. He appears to be conscientious and knows all to well he is inheriting some major problems that need to be solved and evolved.
Violets are here to usher in the new age of peace, acceptance and love, which is coming soon. Violets see the big picture, not necessarily the details and Obama will have to rely on his team to carry out the details of his dream. A team he is assembling at this very moment. While he may not take over the Oval Office until January, he isn't planning on walking in there unprepared.
So what can we do to support Obama's dream? Forget the negativity of the press. Hold the vision of peace, love and equality for all. If we see it, we can be it. And if you are one of those "violets" who came here to do something big then do something. Be yourself. Let your light shine, even for fear of public embarrassment. If I can do it everyday on this blog, so too, can you.
Obama can achieve his vision as long as we all hold it. We can heal our nation and get back to what this country was founded on ingenuity, spontaneity, freedom and equality for all.
Our collective mantra can be, "Yes We Are." And believe me, we are changing. Remember to breathe as you say, "Yes We Are."
Well, I am trying to come up with a blog for Thursday. But honestly I have an election hangover. The hangover is not from alcohol, it is from staying up too late watching history happen.
First, I felt emotional listening to John McCain concede the election to Barack Obama. I cried as he pledged to support and work with the new president elect. I especially loved McCain's acknowledgement of Obama's leadership bridging the long standing racial divide. We can all be proud of that, well at least more than half of us can.
Listening to Obama's acceptance speech gave me goose bumps and sent shivers up and down my spine. Not just because he's a Dem, or because he's the country's first African American president elect. No. Because his words were inspiring.
I feel like he is my President. A president for my generation. I get the same feeling listening to Obama now, as I did when I first heard visionary leader Martin Luther King Jr's. "I Have a Dream," speech. After Bush, Obama is a dream come true. A regular messiah. And he's ours, but don't worry world, we will share him. "Yes We Can." is the vision after King's dream.
It wasn't just the same old speech. It was inspiring. We can do it. "Yes we can." We can heal our differences. "Yes we can." He was inspiring and honest. He didn't say it was going to be easy. But he said if we work together we can do it. "Yes We Can"
The song below, "We've Come So Far," from the "Hairspray Soundtrack" basically says it all. "I know we've come so far, but we've got so far to go. I know the road seems long, but it won't be long till it's time to go."
It's official. I voted. Yay. And the polling station I went to wasn't all, "you have a what? Absentee ballot? George, what do we do with those? Oh, we have a special box for that. Yes, just put it in that old card board box, over there." Apparently those days are over for me. But maybe not for everyone. There were reported voting issues throughout the country ranging from soggy ballots jamming voting machines to five hour voting lines to polling stations opening late.
Did someone just ask, "why does she drop off her absentee ballot? I mailed mine in weeks ago."
Well, it is no secret that I'm not Miss Organized, right? I always think,"this time I'm gonna mail in my ballot, like everyone else." The problem is I'm not like everyone else. The final day to mail in my ballot always comes and goes without my noticing.
Besides, I like dropping off my ballot. I don't feel like I voted without my "I voted" sticker. My Mom always wore her sticker proudly. And she always votes. And who can resist getting fresh baked homemade cookies and coffee after dropping off a ballot weighed down by too many propositions? Not me. Yeah, I'm just like Pavlov's dog without all the drool.
While most polling stations don't offer refreshments, I happen to know a few that do. Is there a better way to teach my kids to vote? Vote and get dessert for breakfast! "When are we voting again?" is second only to "when is it going to be Halloween again?"
It seems to be having a positive effect on my Mom too. She voted earlier saying, "I like going into the booth and voting," but came along for the cookies and coffee. Adding, "my polling station didn't have any treats." Then in her "times just aren't like they used to be," voice said, "the reason there were treats is because the old people made the treats. I like old people."
"Mom you like old people, because you are old people," I remind her.
"Don't remind me," she says.
There were a couple of Wayne's World guys chatting outside the polling station. They were around my age and I thought I overheard one say, "well things aren't going so well, but I thought I'd vote. There's going to be this big change and it was better than killing myself."
Well I hope, for his sake, he is right about the change because his other option isn't very lively.
Yes, I was eavesdropping and I may have misunderstood the conversation, but from where I was standing that is what it sounded like. Suddenly, I was preferring the company of old folks as well. No wonder I hang out with the grandparent pack at Gio's school.
Other election day conversations I eavesdropped on were, "I have a Master's Degree in Science and I didn't understand some of the propositions. I had to use a dictionary and the Internet to vote."
"I'm just glad it's over,"
But really, I think we've just begun.
"How's it going with Obama?" Gio asks inquiring on the Presidential race.
"I hope Barack Obama wins," says Vinny. He's been for Obama for the last year. Even when I was for Hillary. And he voted for him in the mock election at his elementary school.
Starbucks is giving a free cup of coffee to everyone who votes today. I am going in for my cup of coffee with my absentee ballot stubs in hand, as soon as I drop off my ballot.
My prediction for voter turnout is 69% of registered voters will vote in this election. It is going to ruin my day if voter turnout is less than 69%. Help me by voting, please. Thanks. However, if the number is higher than 69% I am ok with being wrong. So go ahead prove me wrong by voting.
There is some serious photo shopping going on here folks. Everyone scream, "green screen hey ho!" But it is still funny even if it's totally fake. As in not real, Grandma. Now go vote!
Wassup 08 The Wassup guys are back with a funny, but important message. Watch it and go vote!
When I first read Proposition 8, I thought, "No problem, that will never pass in California, one of only three states in the country to recognize same sex marriages."
But then I started to notice way too many signs that say, "Yes on 8: Protect Marriage." Really? So if prop 8 passes the hetero world's divorce rate is going down? Probably not.
Now I am worried and confused. How can intelligent people believe someone else's marriage is a threat to their own marriage. Is that a trend in this country, "Let's blame all our problems with marriage on someone else, then we can feel better?"
I believe it was Jesus Christ who said, "Judge not lest ye be judged." Boys and girls, what that really means is when we judge someone we are really judging ourselves. For example, if I have an issue about my nose being big I will suddenly start to notice everyone else's big nose, because I am subconsciously being triggered on my big nose issue. When I come to a place of acceptance regarding my nose, then other people's noses no longer bother me because I am okay with my nose. Proof of my nose acceptance can be found by my shameless display of it on this blog.
Jesus also taught principals of unconditional love, compassion and forgiveness. I am a big fan of Jesus, but not necessarily a fan of any one particular religion. Although, I believe they all have something great to offer. "Many roads leading to the same place." However, religions are not unlike guns: they can be dangerous in the hands of people.
So what I am saying is, perhaps, there are people in this country who are uncomfortable with their own sexuality and marriage. Yet we are obsessed with sexuality and all those slutty famous people. Hmmmmmm.
My solution to this problem is more release, of the orgasmic variety. Yes, I am calling for everyone of legal age to have a minimum of one orgasm a day. And I would never recommend someone try something that I don't already practice myself. Did someone say, "Well I don't have a partner for this kind of thing."
No partner? No problem. And therein lies the beauty of orgasm, my friends, it's a no partner necessary kind of affair. Guys figured this out a long time ago, and frankly it is time for women to join in on the masturbation gangwagon, I mean bandwagon, I think.
Besides when you're alone there isn't anyone to witness or take pictures of all your funny scrunched up faces. So ladies go out and git yourselves a removable shower head, some clothespins and a waterproof, uh, whataretheycalled, penis like thing? Oh yeah, dildo. Or just dig them up out of the drawer they've been hidden away in, and let the fun begin. Ladies, remember the trifecta of an orgasm is simultaneous stimulation of the nipples, g-spot and clitoris. Really.
I got married so I could have dirty sex, legally. And I think that right should be afforded to all people, regardless of their political affiliation. Yes, I'm fair like that. An orgasm a day keeps the female dog away.
Oh, and by the way, voting No on Prop 8 is a vote for being grown up and not poking thy head in thy neighbor's business. But besides that Californians are progressive, forward thinking and extenders of equal rights to all. And we Californians don't want to be remembered in the history books alongside the same people who withheld voting rights from women, or thought it was okay to give African Americans separate facilities, or made it illegal for whites to marry minorities. Do we?
Within a few days of Stefan joining Facebook we had our first Facebook fight. And it wasn't over something frivolous like Facebook cyber sex with old girlfriends from high school or college. No. It was something much more serious.
"What are you doing?" I ask.
"Putting pictures on my Facebook," he answers.
"Well don't put any up of me that I haven't approved first," I instruct.
No more than 15 minutes later I check my email and what does it say?! "Stefan tagged a photo of you on Facebook." And I have two of these emails, not just one, in my inbox.
"Take those photos off right now," I insist.
"What, those are good pictures of you?" he questions me in his own pathetic defense.
"Take them off now, or I am going to start screaming!" I say on the brink of hysteria.
"But what about those bad pictures you put on your blog for the surfing hair post?" he asks confused. "Those pictures are way better than the ones you posted on your blog. Those were bad."
"If I to want post bad pictures of myself on my blog that's one thing, but you can't put up any picture of me on Facebook for the whole world to see."
"Fine, then I will put a link on my Facebook to your bad hair blog," he says.
"What you'll put a link to my blog? Um, okay that's fine," I say as I envision millions of people reading my blog.
My Mom joined Facebook the other day. I told her I would be her friend, unlike those nasty teenage children who refuse to friend their parents. It isn't as if I am doing anything I wouldn't want her to know about.
Let's face it, I'm forty and married with children I need to friend my Mom. Plus, I actually like her. She may be my only witness to the daily madness I endure at the hands of my family. And that doesn't stop her from spoiling all of them.
She is kind of like a fly on the wall or a neutral observer who says, "Yeah you're totally screwed," but doesn't get all upset about everything. Her nonchalance to the insanity actually calms me down because most of the time she is a drama queen.
"Mom, you're gonna love Facebook," I say. "Everyone is on it."
I am sure in about a week she will have more friends than me, since she is a social butterfly to my shy but creative type. She signed up as I was leaving for work. By the time I came back three hours later, she had five friends.
"Everyone is on Facebook," she says happily. "This is so fun!"
Not only that, but she had done the impossible. She inspired my husband to sign up for Facebook in five minutes. I had been coaxing him to sign up for months without any luck.
"Should I use my real name?" asks Stefan. He wasn't kidding, but I laugh anyways.
He soon discovers his Dad, in Germany beat him to Facebook. Welcome to online social networking honey.
The other day, I updated my Facebook status and saw it was my Mom's birthday. I told her not to make her birthday public. Wait a second, I'm the daughter. I almost forgot. Nevermind.
