Mind Of A Mad Woman

Dates with Daddy

2011-06-03T18:45:00.000-07:00

Ever since our daughter was born, I have been adamant that I want her to have a good relationship with her father. I want them to spend time with each other, to learn about each other and relate to each other well. It's an ongoing process, but it's coming together slowly.

Years ago, when she was a baby, I remember someone saying to me that the two of them should go on "dates". But no one could tell me what kind of things they should be doing. Now, I have a pretty good imagination and I'm not stupid by any stretch of the imagination, but it seems that I hit a bit of a wall when it came to this.

It wasn't just the issue of what she could do with him, but also when and how.

And then, this book made its way to me:

Amazing. Really, it is.

Greg Wright is passionate....about his daughters, his love for them and his desire to do right by them. This book is all about how he looked at each of his daughters..really LOOKED at them and then came up with a way to truly connect with them on a personal level.

He took the time to show his daughters that they were important to him and that he was willing and HAPPY to help them grow into the women that he knew they would be.

I'll admit, I was dubious about this book. There are a hundred and one books out there aimed at dads and spending time with their kids and I was dreading reading the same old stuff. I'm happy to report that I was pleasantly surprised. Greg has a way of putting things that sets him apart from all the other "Daddy Doctors".

This book isn't just for dads though. Please don't be fooled by the title because this book, I believe, is just as relevant for mums & daughters, dads & sons, mums & sons. It is for parents & their children. Find the way to connect with your child on a different level and help mold them into the human beings they can be.

Go. Find it. Now.

*****

** This book was provided to me free of charge by BookSneeze.com for my honest review. I am not required to provide a positive opinion, merely an honest one.**

Please Let It Be Over

2011-04-28T03:00:00.000-07:00

My brain is all over the place today. Every time I start a post, it turns into something else because it's just a maelstrom of emotions and thoughts. So I decided to just let it come out and be a little bit random. Bear with me.....

This past weekend, I watched my little sister get married. Not only did she look beautiful, but she looked happy. Her husband is amazing and balances her out brilliantly. The wedding was perfect and I didn't kill myself walking in heels....mostly because we abandoned that idea in favour of flats so that people would actually be looking at the gorgeous bride instead of her giant blueberry of a sister sweating like a roast pig and in danger of passing out. It's a bit surreal to think that my sister is a wife at the ripe old age of 20 but I've never been prouder. But I'm glad it's over.

Speaking of weddings, I'm beginning to think that I am the only one who doesn't really care about this Royal wedding. Actually it's a bit beyond not caring. I'm kind of stuck in the camp that would like it to please be over as soon as possible before I throw my tv out the window. If we were playing a drinking game where we had to do shots every time someone on tv mentioned the upcoming nuptials between Prince & commoner, I'd have been dead of alcohol poisoning a long time ago. Please let it all be over. Now.

We've been enjoying school holidays for almost two weeks now. I use the word "enjoying" loosely. I came into these holidays with optimism. I was looking forward to some quality time with the kids, playing the parks and having a great time. Thing is, the weather's been shit. Total and utter. Last week wasn't so bad but the kids spent most of that at a fun holiday program in the mornings and then we spent the weekend in Wellington at the wedding of the year. This week? Craptastic. In fact, we had some mini tornadoes touch down in a town not far from here and rip roofs off houses. So, needless to say, we've been cooped up. Also fairly obviously, I'm going nuts. The kids are stir crazy and they're doing everything in their power to make me go completely gray. Please let it be over.

When we moved here, we got a $2000 Honda Accord. It was a 1989 so, given that we aren't completely stupid, we knew it was an old car and was going to need some work. What we weren't prepared for was the amount of work involved. CV joints, brake lines, brakes, new tires, CV joints again, steering, alternators, blah blah blah....we fixed them all. We borrowed cars, we went without cars, we dealt with it. The latest in this long string of stuff is that the transmission is shot. Now, if this was a new car, we might consider fixing it. But it's not and I am past giving a shit, so we are giving up. We'll soon have a slightly newer car which, if the universe is at all smart, will not give us any crap. Please let it be over.

I don't usually pay tooooo much attention to what the celebudorks are up to, but I'll be damned if Charlie "I'm Winning" Sheen isn't hard to ignore. What is wrong with the guy? And people are buying into his crap! That's what's even harder to believe. People are paying money to go and see this douche-canoe spout his bullshit on a stage, half dressed, while his "goddesses" make out behind me. Excuse me, but is there perhaps anything better your money could be spent on? Maybe next time you have an urge to spend that much money to see someone rant on about ridiculous things, you could just hand me the wad of cash? Please let it be over.

Here in New Zealand, drunk drivers are a huge problem. Because of this, they run ads all the time that are meant to combat this. Some of them are ok. But there's one that they run all the freakin' time that is driving me and Hotty Hubby crazy. Please let it be over:

And because I love you all so much....I'm going to let this post be over. Right now. You're welcome.

Missing You

2011-04-14T22:05:00.000-07:00

When I met your grandson back in the summer of 2001, I was smitten. We were together all the time. We spent hours walking around town, sitting in parks and coffee shops and staying up late talking. We talked about everything to do with our lives and within a week we knew we wanted to be together. But one of the things I couldn't wrap my head around was his distance from you...his grandmother.

He told me it just hadn't been the same since his mom, your daughter, died when he was 12. Well, we were now 12 year on and this distance wasn't getting any shorter. It just wouldn't do. No man of mine was going to keep his family at bay. So I told him he needed to start calling you more often. He did. I told him he needed to keep up to date on his life. He did. I told him he needed to go visit you and that if he felt like taking me with him to make introductions, that would be fine too.

So he did.

On Christmas Day.

Do you remember? I do. The looks on all your faces were priceless! He'd not only shown up when he was asked to, but he showed up with a girl in tow. Hmmm, maybe he was serious about this chick. But they'd only been together a few months.

Wait. What?!

Yeah...your expressions got even better after we announced we were already engaged.

And pregnant.

Holy crap on a stick....what was he thinking?! Um, I can tell you now that he wasn't. Neither of us was. I was so intent on getting him to mend his broken fences that I hadn't really thought through the whole process.

I have to hand it to you though. You were awesomeness personified. You welcomed me with open arms, made me feel like I belonged there and even ran around raiding other people's stockings so that you could give me something for Christmas. You fed me, you laughed with me (and AT me), and you hugged me as hard as you could when we left to go home.

I truly believe that on that Christmas night in 2001, I became a part of your family for real.

I never had a mother in law, she'd been gone for years...but you filled the part well. Over the next 9 years we laughed, we cried, we reminisced, we cried some more and hey...we laughed a LOT.

When Hotty Hubby and I separated, you didn't turn your back on me and the kids. If anything, you held on tighter. When we reconciled, you celebrated just as much as we did. You were there for birthdays, anniversaries, Christmas, Thanksgiving, Easter and many more inconsequential days.

I never told you, but you were a huge influence in my life and the way I live it. You gave me courage and made me realise it just didn't matter what other people thought of me. Your opinion was important to me.

When we started talking about moving to New Zealand, the biggest obstacle for me was you. I hated the idea of leaving you behind. We knew that you weren't going to be around forever and that if we left, we'd likely never see you again. We almost changed our minds but then you turned the tables. You gave us your blessing and sent us on our way. I will be eternally grateful for that.

Last week, we heard you were in hospital. Again. My heart started to break. Again. I prayed and hoped and crossed every cross-able appendage in an effort to convince whatever Powers That Be that were paying attention to just make you better.

Three days ago, I arrived home from work to hear that you were gone.

I know that you are in that better place that everyone talks about. I know that you're not hurting anymore. I know that you're happy to not be connected to all those tubes and wires anymore, because they just pissed you off. More than anything, I know that you're happy to be with your equally awesome husband, Art, and your beautiful daughter, Susan, again.

But that doesn't make it any easier for us down here. We miss you. Deeply.

I'm not entirely sure how Hotty Hubby is taking it. You know him, he's stoic. I know he's hurting, I just don't think he knows how to express that. Maybe I need to take him to the shooting range and let him blow crap away.

Boy Spawn doesn't fully understand the whole concept of death. He knows you're gone, he knows he won't see you again, but I think that's as far as it goes right now.

Girl Spawn? Well. She crumbled. You and her always had a very special relationship. I never fully understood the connection between the two of you, but I knew it was amazing. The two of you were...well, fantastic. She cried. A lot. She misses you so much and, like the rest of us, wishes she had been able to say goodbye.

As for me, it doesn't quite seem real to me. Or maybe I just don't want it to be. I continue to process, I continue to cry and I continue to wish it were all a dream.

Beth, you were an awesome woman who made us all laugh and smile. You gave the best hugs, some great advice and even taught me a few things. I hope that wherever you are, you're with Art & Susan and looking down on us. I'm sure that if you are, you're sitting there thinking "well, shit......that boy needs to shave, Maggie's lookin' good, and the kids are as bouncy as ever".

Rest in Peace, Mama Beth......we'll miss you forever. xxx

Love On Assignment

2011-04-04T12:45:00.000-07:00

We all know there's nothing I like more than books. Ok, well maybe food, but books are right up there. So, when I found BookSneeze, I jumped at the chance to review books for them. I didn't realise right away that their books are primary Christian titles, but actually it hasn't fazed me at all. As someone who struggles daily with my faith (or lack thereof, depending on the day), it's been a new experience to sit down and finish books like this...but I've certainly enjoyed it. It was a nice break from the murder mystery stuff I usually read.

I should probably mention right about now that in accordance with the FTC Guidelines, I was not paid for this review. The publisher provided me with a complimentary copy of the book but the review is mine alone and I am not required to publish a positive review in return.

LOVE ON ASSIGNMENT by Cara Lynn James

The story is set in 1900 in Rhode Island. Charlotte Hale is a wannabe reporter trying to make her way in the world while she supports her sister. She is sent to investigate Daniel Wilmont, a professor and columnist who is upsetting the locals with his views on business practices. Daniel is a very outspoken Christian man and his opinions do not sit well with many. She goes undercover as a governess for his two children with the task of finding some dirt on Daniel to report back to the paper in the hopes of ruining him.

Instead of finding dirt, Charlotte finds herself struggling with her own lack of faith and ultimately finds God.

I didn't read the first book in this series, and after reading this one, I'm not sure I ever will. While it is a sweet story, I found it a bit too much. The writing style seemed to be more aimed at teenagers rather than adults. Bits of the book were incredibly predictable which annoys me more than anything, but I did enjoy the moral discussions as Charlotte wrestled with her conscience.

I guess in the end, if you're looking for a light read that isn't going to send your own conscience into a tailspin, then this book is for you. It has just enough historical fact in it to keep your brain going and is just vanilla enough that your teenager could read it.

Did you hear that??

2011-03-01T00:05:00.000-08:00

If you were listening very closely last week, you may have heard a sound that was hard to identify. It may have been soft, it may have been very loud. It may have been difficult to distinguish from the everyday sounds around you. Then again, you may not have heard anything at all.

Last Tuesday, February 22nd, the city of Christchurch, NZ was rocked by an earthquake. Again. This time, much much worse than the one in September. You see, although the one in September was bigger in magnitude (7.1 vs 6.3), this one was shallower (5kms vs 33kms deep) and centred closer to the city. And with those factors in play, the city crumbled - in so many ways.

Buildings collapsed, buses were crushed, people ran screaming into the streets, only to find themselves confronted with more destruction than they could ever imagine. Within minutes, it was breaking news on TV. Within hours, our phone lines were tied up with people trying to find each other. Within days, the country as a whole had been brought to its knees.

We have watched hours and hours of media coverage. We have cried with joy and with desperate sadness. We have cheered as more and more Search and Rescue teams arrive in the country to help and cried as the realisation has set in that they are really more of a Search and Recovery.

Over the last week, the death toll has climbed higher than any of us had thought it would. As I write this, it stands at 155 people dead and still many missing. Many of the people I know have been directly affected, losing family and friends. Many more are just amazed that this is what we are dealing with.

We've read first person accounts of the terror that people felt and watched too many hours of tv broadcasts surrounding it. It's just all.....too much.

There has got to be a limit to how much this small country can take, and I think we are fast approaching it. Two earthquakes and a mining disaster in the space of 6 months is just.....enough. I don't think we can take it anymore.

From a purely personal point of view, it has certainly made me think. In my head I have mapped out every possible route from clients' houses, shops & libraries to get to my children as quickly as possible. I can tell you how I'd get there in my car, on a bike or on foot. And I can tell you that while I think running is the exercise invented by demons, I'd be running as fast as I could to get to my children.

I have compiled MOST of an emergency kit for the house and some stuff to go in the shed and the car.

I have talked to my children about what to do if it happens.

I have ...... become paranoid.

People, this country is hurting. I have heard talk of how "only" 155 people are dead. And yes, I can see how that would seem like a small number compared to Haiti or Chile or the tragedy of 9/11. But in a country like this where everyone knows someone who knows someone else, it hits very close to home.

Kiwi men have a reputation for being very stoic, very strong, very "she'll be 'right". Over the last week, I have seen more grown men cry than I ever hope to again.

That sound you may have heard a week ago? That was the sound of our collective hearts breaking. But Christchurch will rise again. They will mourn their dead, they will clear away the rubble and they will rise again. With the help of the country, the student army and the rescuers on the ground....they will rise.

In the meantime? Please keep this little corner of the world in your thoughts...Christchurch in particular. Our Prime Minister is launching a global fundraising campaign, but I am launching a global blog love fest. Send your love our way. Please.

"Kia Kaha Christchurch"

Forever Strong

Switcheroo

2011-02-19T00:30:00.000-08:00

If someone were to ask you today, "Who would you like to switch lives with for one day?", what would you say?

I think that many people would come up with a whole slew of famous names. Perhaps women would like to switch with Angelina Jolie or Vanessa Paradis so that they could have just one day with Brad or Johnny. Men might choose Brad Pitt or Brian Austin Green so that they could get it on with Angelina or Megan Fox. Heck, I can come up with a ton of famous chicks I'd like to possess so that I could spend some time with their men.

Other folks might try to be all noble and come up with names like Nelson Mandela or Mother Theresa (were she still alive) so that they could find out what it was like to do such good works for humanitarian aid. Or maybe a politician or two so that they could make the changes that they think are necessary to make a particular city or country run more smoothly.

And then you have the "I'm so freakin' funny it hurts" crowd who would say they want to switch with a member of the opposite sex so that they can play with themselves all day. I suppose it'd be fun, but not worth it for the entire day.

I can see the merit in all of them. I really can. But when I saw the prompt for Day 17 of "30 Days of Me" - "someone you would want to switch lives with for one day and why" - I knew right away it wasn't going to be someone famous and it sure as hell wasn't going to be becoming a man so I could get my rocks off with myself.

If I could switch lives with anyone for a day, I'd choose one of my children. Ever since the day I watched Jamie Lee Curtis and Lindsey "I'm a skank ho" Lohan switch places in "Freaky Friday", the idea has intrigued me.

Can you imagine? We're all so tired at the end of the day after running around doing endless errands, chasing kids, working, acting as chauffeur/cook/referee. Imagine how wonderful it would be to be on the other side of that!

* Boundless energy

* Personal chef

* Chauffeur at the ready

* Play time

* Nap time if we need it/want it

* No bills

* Few responsibilities beyond tidying a room or feeding a pet

Did I mention boundless energy? I did! I'll say it again. ENERGY! What I wouldn't give to have half the energy that my spawnlets have. We get up just after 6am every day to drive Hotty Hubby to work and they are on the go from the minute they get up to the minute their heads hit the pillow at night. I have no idea how they do it. I've tried getting more sleep, more exercise, eating better foods, guzzling energy drinks....none of it works, and I've had to face the simple fact that I am, quite simply, getting older.

So, who would I switch with? I'd switch with a child aged 6 to 8. I'd eat the adults out of house and home, I'd bounce on a trampoline, run through the fields, sleep during the day if I wanted to, play to my hearts content, and generally drive the big people crazy.

And then, when I reverted back to my old, fat, adult state.....I'd go have a Nanna Nap because I was so exhausted from my day as a kid.

Summer Lovin'

2011-02-15T18:55:00.000-08:00

One of the strangest/most wonderful/interesting things about this country that I now live in, is that the whole country virtually shuts down for two to three weeks over the holiday season. As a result, I sort of found myself shutting down. I was hardly online and when I was, I wasn't doing anything blog related. And it was GREAT! I missed you all terribly but, no offense, didn't feel guilty at all about not visiting your blogs or even writing my own. The break was great and now I realise why people here shut down. It's great for your mental health.

I'm back now, my sanity is still debatable, and I've got things to do and say. I'll still finish that "30 Days of Me" that I was working on, but in the meantime here's the highlights from this summer in New Zealand:

** The spawnlets finished the 2010 school year (our year runs Feb - Dec) with a bang. While they didn't get anything at the end of year Prize Giving, they did get to do their victory walk down the centre aisle to a round of applause and collect their report card.

** Lil Sis and her man were able to come and spend Christmas with us here and it was the first time in years that we had both been at HOME with our mum for the holidays. We spent the few days that they were visiting playing Wii, eating ourselves stupid and enjoying the sun. We even managed a beach visit.

** New Years Eve was great and it was the first one that we've allowed the kids to stay up for. After a short nap mid-afternoon, they stayed up with us and watched movies until midnight. We did our countdown, drank some sparkling grape juice and then got to make some noise with party poppers outside when my mother came to scare the pants off us.

** No resolutions were made in this house and that's just how we like it. I figure you just set yourself up for failure when you make resolutions.

** Hotty Hubby was laid off from his job after one and a half years of working his butt off for them as a labourer. He was not the only one, five other guys were given the ol' heave ho as well, but it was certainly poor timing for us.

** We moved. We packed up the old house that had been sold, brought a bunch of stuff over to the new place, and promptly discovered that it was infested with ants and cockroaches. YUM! After a couple of smoke bombs and some sprays, I think we've conquered them. The roaches are a big problem this year and especially in this part of town. It's like they've decided that in their quest to take over the world, they're going to start with my little town.

** Hotty Hubby found a new job. More pay, more hours, more training and learning opportunities. The only drawback thus far is that I have to drag MY fat ass out of bed so damn early in the morning to drive him to work. He's enjoying it so far so I really can't complain too much.

** School is back in session and the kids are excited for the 2011 year. Boy Spawn has moved on to Year 2 (Grade 1) and Girl Spawn on to Year 4 (Grade 3). They both have fantastic teachers and thankfully it's not awkward having a friend of ours be Girl Spawn's teacher.

Summer is almost over. As of March 1st, we'll be into Fall. I'm not entirely sure how they figure out the seasons here, I just go with it. Here's to a fantastic year, and I'll be sure to visit y'all more often!

Musical pictures

2010-12-11T00:42:00.000-08:00

Some of the "30 Days of Me" prompts leave me feeling very pathetic, yet I'm going with it. I'm going to save us all some pain and misery and combine days 14, 15 & 16 into one post. Then it's over and done with and we can all move on to something else. Deal? Deal!

Day 14 - A picture of your and your family

Taken 2 weeks ago

Day 15 - Put your iPod on shuffle: First 10 songs that play

*sigh*...I have the crappiest selection of music on there right now, but here goes:

1) "One Foot Wrong" - Pink
2) "Hello" - Evanescence
3) "What I've Done" - Linkin Park
4) "Jigga What/Faint" - Linkin Park & Jay-Z
5) "CrushCrushCrush" - Paramore
6) "Black Betty" - Spiderbait
7) "Hot Girls" - INXS
8) "Marry You" - Bruno Mars
9) "You Make It Real" - James Morrison
10) "If I Never See Your Face Again" - Maroon 5

Day 16 - Another picture of yourself

Taken 2 weeks ago

Hey you! You hurt me!

2010-12-09T20:15:00.000-08:00

I'm not entirely sure there's anyone out there reading this drivel anymore. To be honest, I kind of lost interest. I wasn't sure if I had grown out of the whole blogging thing or if I was going through yet another "can't be bothered" phase or if I was just having my millionth mind block since I started this here blog. I still don't know, but I thought I'd come back and see if I could finish this whole "30 days of Me" thing that I had going so that I could at least cross it off my never ending To Do list.

Day 13 (and I'm not going to link to the other days...you can troll the archives if you give a shit) tells me that I should write a letter to someone who has hurt me. I suppose this prompt would be considered partly to blame for my absence because I just couldn't decide who to write the letter to. There were a couple of people I considered who have had it coming for a while but I was unsure how to go about it without in turn hurting some other folks. So I left it. In the end, I went with this:

**********

Dear You,

You know who you are. You know very well. And you know exactly what it is you've done to hurt me. Day in and day out you find a new way to bring me down. With every passing week it seems that you have discovered a way to tune out any of the good things that you've heard coming my direction and just carry on down your own path of "destroy Maggie's self esteem".

You look at me with disgust, with scorn, with contempt, with.......with the opinion that I'm not good enough. You tell me I'm fat. You tell me I'm lazy. You tell me I'm ugly and that you can't understand why the gorgeous man I married is still with me. You leave me with the belief that I am not good enough for my husband or anyone else in my life and have even made me question my abilities as a mother to the two wonderful children who have blessed my life.

I have gotten better at rising above, at lifting myself to a level where you can no longer affect me. I can still hear you. Like the incessant buzzing of a housefly circling my head before perching on my shoulder to take the biggest dump possible, you are always there. I can close my eyes, I can put my fingers in my ears....but I can still hear you. You don't have the same impact that you once did, but the fact is, I can't escape you.

Every day, I listen to you. Every day, you are there. Every day, you try and bring me down.

You hurt me and I can't get away from you. But you know what, Brain? You can suck it...because I'm going to make a conscious (pun totally intended) effort to ignore you and your nastiness from now on.

Cheers,
Me

If anyone finds out, I will die of embarrassment

2010-11-18T01:27:00.000-08:00

It's been awhile since we've heard anything from this awesome gal over here at Casa Mad Woman. I've had this guest post sitting in my inbox for over a month and keep forgetting to schedule it, so I hope she'll forgive me. Let's give a big ol' crazy welcome to Frantic Mommy, the Queen of the Kingdom of TIRED.

**********

Thank goodness we are way past this stage…but there was a time our family had a secret.

It was our version of a well hid, dark secret.

It was something that hung over my head for years. And if anyone (back then) would have known the truth, I would have died of embarrassment.

The secret? Well, here it is.

When it comes to pacifiers with my kids…I am a big, giant puss-ball.

A wimp.

A total pushover.

The bottom line is, because I was such a wussy-sack-o-crap, both our kids had paci’s wwwaaayyyy too long.

Like, until they were almost 4.

Seriously.

Now do you see why I was embarrassed?

For our son it was his “gucky” and for our daughter it was her “corky”. But to me it was a crutch that I couldn’t seem to help them disengage from. So I didn’t. And the months ticked by.

Looking back now, it sounds so silly, but those “corkies and guckies” weighed our family down. A good friend moved away and repeatedly encouraged our family to come for a visit. I repeatedly declined, too embarrassed to admit that I had a 3+ y.o that still wanted a paci at night.

We suffered through the drama with our son, who gave his up right before his 4 th birthday. After several nights of howling and bawling, I swore I would never do that again. I would be stronger “Next Time.”

But along came our daughter and I managed to make the same mistake all over again.

I remember the day I finally sucked-it-up and decided rid our house of the very last Corky (our daughter’s). I waited until hubs and the 7 year old were out of town. I was pretty sure I couldn’t handle the impending drama with them yappin at me.

And I prepared.

I fretted…..for days.

I lost sleep over it.

I made up this elaborate story to our daughter about how the Corky Fairies were coming to take her Corkies back to their Mommies. I steeled myself for drama.

That morning, I told Princess Sara Boo it “was time” and we left her corkies in a dish on the counter as we left the house for the day. As we walked out, I covertly slipped them into my pocket.

I needed to get them hell OUT of the house. If they were GONE there was no way I could chicken out. There was no going back on this. Period.

As I drove my little one to daycare I plotted the Corky Disposal Plan. Maybe, I could throw them in the daycare lady’s garbage…

…but if she saw them, I would just DIE of embarrassment.

Then I thought I could throw them in the dumpster at a church donation facility that I was dropping off at that day. But when I got there, the workers were already there and if they saw me pitch two pacifiers, I would just DIE of embarrassment.

I finally settled on the dumpster at work. But when I opened it, it was empty. To throw two pacifiers in a bare dumpster might get noticed. And commented on. And if anyone saw, I would just DIE of embarrassment.

Finally I settled on the cardboard recycling dumpster and tucked the last two precious (well worn ) corkies in a box, shut the lid and walked away.

I chuckled as I envisioned (days later) an employee of the Recycling Center sorting boxes, encountering The Corkies and probably thinking “WTF??”

That night, my little Princess never said a peep. Never asked for them. Moved on like a trooper.

Sometimes we do make mountains out of molehills in life.

Did I make a big mistake by letting my kids have their pacis too long?? YUP

I admit it. I could make all sorts of excuses like “at least they didn’t suck their thumb” or “at least everyone slept well”.

Really? Whatever. I know the reality now.

So take this post with a grain of salt and please don’t leave me any long lecturing posts about irresponsible parenting. I am a pretty nice gal, but mean as sh#t when I need to be.

Just know I feel parenthood is about sharing, comparing notes, and maybe even learning from other people’s mistakes.

Go right ahead and learn from mine.

Thanks for listening

Franticmommy

Because. Just because.

2010-11-16T00:54:00.000-08:00

Day 1 -- Day 2 -- Day 3 -- Day 4 -- Day 5 -- Day 6 -- Day 7 -- Day 8 -- Day 9

Day 10 -- Day 11

**********

Howdy!

You know kids hit a certain age and decide that they want to know "why?" about everything? We answer them for a while, we even try and come up with creative answers for the first 20 times they ask. Eventually we get tired of playing, perhaps even get a bit pissed off, and we end up saying "Because. Just because. That's why!". Oddly enough, this doesn't always work, but it certainly makes us feel better. Or maybe that's just me.

When I read today's prompt for "30 Days of Me", I just wanted to shout "BECAUSE!!!!". Why? Because I'm meant to tell you how I found out about Blogger and why I made one. Oh yawn. But ok.

How did I find out about it? Um, let's see. Could it possibly be that everyone and their brother has a blog on Blogger? Sure, their cousins and sister-wives are all over on Wordpress, but their brothers are here.

As for why I made one, I was originally over on Wordpress. I had the idea of setting up a blog but didn't really know where to start. One of Hotty Hubby's friends set me up over there and it was going well. Then when I didn't post for a while, I went back to find it gone. He thought I'd given up and had disabled it. He had the control, which was fine initially, but after I had a falling out with his wife and a couple of our mutual friends, it became increasingly difficult. I wanted to control the way my blog looked, the frequency with which I posted and the password too.

So, I looked around, and ta-da! Blogger!

I guess a better question would be why do I stay with Blogger. Well, mostly because I haven't got the faintest idea how to go to my own domain name easily, cheaply, efficiently, and with a minimum of fuss. Maybe one day! I'm getting to the point of needing a change so it might happen.

A good friend is cheaper than therapy

2010-11-14T00:23:00.000-08:00

Day 1 -- Day 2 -- Day 3 -- Day 4 -- Day 5 -- Day 6 -- Day 7 -- Day 8 -- Day 9

Day 10

**********

*sigh* Boring!

Another picture of me and my friends is what I'm meant to share with you today. I'm not really sure what to share. I've been through my files and I'm going to go with this one:

The beautiful redhead on the left is one of my best friends ever....Ginger Rug. The gorgeous gal on the right is another of my best friends....we'll call her Rickie. These two got me through a lot in the year and a half or so before we moved to New Zealand and I miss them, and their spawn, desperately.

I tried to find a picture of the three of us with our other friend, Punchy...but alas, none were to be found. Perhaps I'll find one later.

The title I chose for this post is accurate. A good friend IS cheaper than therapy. I can't even begin to describe how much of an effect Ginger Rug, Rickie and Punchy had on my life, and continue to have to this day. They always had a shoulder to cry on, were there to laugh with or rant at, and our kids always got along well. They all had girls the same age as my son and he loved it. Our husbands liked each other and shared much the same sense of humour. Life was awesome.

I miss them a lot, and wish I could see them again, but I know that with the wonders of Facebook and Skype, we'll always be able to keep in touch.

Girls, I love ya!

Music is what feelings sound like

2010-11-12T23:51:00.000-08:00

Day 1 -- Day 2 -- Day 3 -- Day 4 -- Day 5 -- Day 6 -- Day 7 -- Day 8 -- Day 9

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*sing with me!*

On the 10th day of whatever this is, your true love (that'd be me) gave you ..... not a whole heck of a lot.

Today, for "30 Days of Me", I am supposed to tell you what songs I listen to when I'm happy, sad, bored, hyped or mad. I was surprised at how difficult this was for me at first. You see, I'll listen to pretty much anything, at any time. It doesn't usually matter what kind of mood I'm in. So I had to put a bit more thought into this one. I had to delve deep into the recesses of my rapidly shriveling brain to retrieve what little bit of information has been hiding there.

I didn't discover much.

I have what my husband likes to call a "sucky" taste in music. I like to call it "varied".

Last month I heard that new song by Bruno Mars, "Just the Way You Are". As intrigued as I was by his funky name, the title of the song didn't particularly appeal. I mean, who the hell needs yet another soppy ass love song to make them feel shitty about the way their own romantic life is progressing? Then I actually listened to it and I was slightly less cynical. I even passed it on to make a few people feel better about themselves. It has that power. I decided, on a whim, to check out the rest of his songs. Turns out, these now fall nicely into the "songs I listen to when I'm happy" category. He has a bit of a folky style in some of them, and most of them are upbeat.

Sad or bored? A bit of Evanescence, Paramore, Linkin Park....gets me out of my funk and heading toward at least a glass of wine and a snuggle.

Hyped? A little bit of Black Eyed Peas or Pink will do me.

But when I'm mad? I like to crank some System of a Down or Tool to rage out to. There is nothing better than screaming along with the hard rockin' sounds of either of those bands to make you feel better. I suppose the next best thing would be to put an ex boyfriend's picture on a dartboard.

So what do YOU listen to in your various moods?

Pride goeth before a fall

2010-11-10T22:11:00.000-08:00

Day 1 -- Day 2 -- Day 3 -- Day 4 -- Day 5 -- Day 6 -- Day 7 -- Day 8

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It's been too long. Things got busy around here. You know, just when I think I don't have a life, it totally comes and gets in the way.

Anyhoozle, my poor time management skills aside, I thought it was about time that I finally got around to continuing this whole "30 Days of Me" thing that I've been working on for over a month now. Sad really that this is only the 9th entry for that.

So, for Day 9 I am meant to tell you something that I'm proud of in the last few days.

Oh come back, don't worry! I'm not going to beat that old dead horse by the name of "Ishallnotscreamatmyspawn". Mostly because that's not going so well. That MAY have something to do with my (potentially genetic) low patience disorder, or it may have something to do with the fact that they've both been absolute shits lately. Either way, we won't be talking about that today because I'm not done thrashing that deceased equine yet.

What am I proud of then? Well. Turns out I am astonishingly good at setting boundaries in my life.......when I have enough people tell me to do that.

I seem to have rather a habit of taking on too much. To some of the people who know me, this might sound like absolute bullhooey but I assure you, it's true. When people need a volunteer, I am powerless to stop my hands from flinging themselves up in the air, my bat-wings doing their own little dance, to say "pick me! pick ME!". This is how I first ended up being the Secretary and then the President of the PTA at the last school the spawn attended. Don't get me wrong, I enjoyed it, but it quickly grew from chairing a monthly meeting, to organizing fundraisers, to staffing those fundraisers, to .....well you get the picture. And it was the same 12 people always doing everything. I was lucky to have an amazing best friend, Ginger Rug, helping me out and keeping me relatively sane.

At the same time that I was doing the PTA thing, I was also working nights at the No Tell Motel and looking after a little boy during the day.

To say I was overstretched would be an understatement. When we moved to NZ, I made myself a promise that I wouldn't repeat the same thing. And I haven't. Sort of.

I work as a Community Support Worker. I do care of the elderly & disabled. I go into their homes and help them. Lately I have found myself picking up more hours, which is nice. What wasn't nice is that I was working 7 days a week. 7 evenings a week. Granted, some of those days I only did 3 hours work, but still. I had volunteered to work every evening when one of the girls went off sick. I thought it would be a short term thing. Three months later, I was still at it and I'd had enough.

I hadn't been home to put the kids to bed in months.

I hadn't had a coherent, adult conversation with Hotty Hubby (he has objected to being called The Man) in ages.

I was tired and grumpy and sick to death of going out for an hour or two every night. It was rarely worth the gas to go in my car.

Hotty Hubby was sick of it. And he made that known.

Finally, my new friend (squeee...I have friends here now!) Dino gave me the prod I needed and I headed into the office. I laid it all out on the table, I told them what I wanted and told them what would happen if I didn't get it and thankfully no one called my bluff.

And now? I work 2 nights during the week for an hour and both nights on the weekends for two hours.

The kids ...... happy.

The husband ..... happy.

The friend ..... proud.

Me? ..... ecstatic. And proud.

GOAL!!!

2010-10-28T15:20:00.000-07:00

Day 1 -- Day 2 -- Day 3 -- Day 4 -- Day 5 -- Day 6 -- Day 7

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Goals.

We all make them, we all try to reach them, we all sometimes fail. Every person has a different set of goals in their life. Some people want to save money to buy a house, some people want to travel all over the world. Goals are an inevitable part of our lives and will always be.

For Day 8 of "30 Days of Me", I am meant to tell you what my short term goals are for this month...and why. Seeing as October is pretty much over, I'm going to go with November. The problem is, I hadn't really thought about my goals for the month, I was just trying to get through October! But we'll have a go.....

#1 - Continue with my non yelling goal from October (I mentioned this on Day 4). Why? Because it's been going fairly well. I still find myself yelling occasionally but it is finally starting to be at a time that actually warrants it. I'm not yelling for silly things as much, and am beginning to pause for thought before reacting to whatever problem is at hand. Perhaps I'll be able to break the habit after all?

#2 - Amp up my exercise regime. Or rather....create a proper one. Why? Because my sister is getting married in April and I need to shift a TON more of this weight. I let some of my old, bad habits creep back in over the winter and ended up hitting a plateau. So now is the time to start fresh. It's Spring and I'm loving that the scale is finally going down again.

#3 - Spend more time with my hubby. Why? Because I've been working too many evenings and weekends lately and it is starting to take its toll on both of us. I've already made a good start on this goal by setting some much needed boundaries at work and ask for some evenings off. Bring on the date nights!!

#4 - Finish organizing the house. Why? We've only lived here just over a year but I'm amazed at the sheer amount of crap we seem to have gathered. So I've been organizing, purging, sorting, moving and tidying. Ideally I would have someone who would come and do my vacuuming and bathrooms for me, but seeing as that isn't an option, I will have to do it my way. *sigh*

That's about it. I'm not a big goal maker, so this will have to do.

Deep Impact

2010-10-18T02:00:00.000-07:00

Day 1 -- Day 2 -- Day 3 -- Day 4 -- Day 5 -- Day 6

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Sometimes it can be very difficult to follow something like these prompts. As I go through the "30 Days of Me", I can find some that are incredibly easy and some that actually make me sit and think for awhile. If you look for long enough, you could probably see the smoke coming out of my ears and my eyes spinning around just from the sheer hard work that thinking requires.

Day 7 is exactly that kind of prompt. I'm supposed to post a picture of someone or something that has had the biggest impact on me.

Um. Wow?!

I suppose that for some of you, choosing that someone or something might be easy. For me, it opened up a million doors of consideration. Should it be a good or a bad impact? Is it better for it to be a someONE or a someTHING? If I choose a person, do I do so at the risk of offending everyone else in my life by not picking them? If I choose a thing, do I look like a bit of a tool? And how do you decide what the biggest impact was? A significant impact to me, might seem just run of the mill to the rest of you.

I considered choosing books and waxing lyrical about the profound effect that they've had on my life and how if I had to live without books, I might have to gouge my eyes out with a hot spoon.

But, we already know about my passion for literature (and the fluffy crap that they like to publish these days). So I abandoned that thought.

I thought about telling you all about my love of travel and how living all over the world has had such an amazing impact on my life - from meeting new people, to learning about new cultures, travel is amazing.

In the end though, I decided that this is what has had the biggest impact by FAR on my life to this point:

Cheesy. I know. But true. The fruit of my loins, the spawn, the ones I call the life suckers - my beautiful children.

From the moment that my daughter was born over 8 years ago and my son two years later, I have learned a lot about myself and what I am capable of.

I am capable of loving more than I ever thought possible. My heart grew a hundred fold with each of the kids and with everything they do, it grows more.

I am capable of handling more than I would care to but again, more than I ever thought I could. Watching your child struggle for breath in the hospital, or watching them drift in and out of consciousness is a real test of your strength. Thankfully I have never had to deal with anything major, like some of you, and I pray I never will....but I am happy to know that I can deal with more than I ever thought.

I have also discovered how incapable I am of dealing with some things.

I am not able to sit idly by and watch anyone purposely hurt my children.

I can't bear to see my children hurt for any reason. Skinned knee, hurt feelings, illness - it all makes my heart hurt with the pain of a thousand arrows.

I am finding it increasingly hard to deal with the fact that eventually they will not need me anymore. As they get older and more independent, I realise that there will come a day when they leave me behind to begin a life of their own. With every birthday, I shed a few more tears.

So there you have it. I can't think of any other thing that has had quite the impact on my life that those two have had. And you know what? I wouldn't have it any other way.

Up, Up and AWAY!

2010-10-14T01:15:00.000-07:00

Day 1 -- Day 2 -- Day 3 -- Day 4 -- Day 5

*****

Superheroes. They climb walls, they fly, they have cool cars, they have alter egos and they keep the world safe from the scum of the earth. As children, we watched the movies and the tv shows.

For Day 6 of "30 Days of Me", I'm to tell you who my favorite superhero was and why. You might be surprised to find that I'm not entirely sure who that person might be. How can you choose from so many seemingly amazing characters?

Superman - the dude can FLY! Full on, up in the air, carrying planes, FLY! And his cape isn't just for show like some other heroes. He can do things with his eyes that most men can only ever dream of and the only thing that can really bring him down is an ugly crystal.

Spiderman - so the climbing up walls thing is pretty cool but the suit was never my thing. Plus, while Superman was the somewhat hunky Clark Kent by day, Peter Parker was a bit of a dweeb. On the other hand, if you ever wanted to be tied up........

Wonder Woman - OOohhh look at her. She can spin. And deflect things with her wrists. Guess what...so can I. Mind you, my wrist deflection usually involves me going one step further and bitch slapping someone, but it's still wrist action right?

Batman - For a guy with that much money, I'm a little disappointed that he keeps his gear stashed in a cave instead of a gold plated vault. Plus, the fact that he keeps a skinny minny, named after a bird, around for company is a bit odd. But the car......I'd leave my husband for that car.

Catwoman...yawn. Iron Man....cool suit. Hellboy....scary, how'd he get hero status?

There's so many superheroes that it really is hard to pick one. I think some people might say a nice mash-up of all of them might be nice.

**I've linked up for all you uber geeks like The Man**

But those are all the big name people. What about the little guys? What about people like Captain Planet, She-Ra, Velma from Scooby Doo? Let's not forget about them!

For the purposes of this exercise, I think I'll choose one that I've always thought was kind of awesome.

Elektra!!

She is all kinds of fantastic and her outfit is H-O-T.

So, who would YOU be?

Oh the places you'll go!

2010-10-12T01:06:00.000-07:00

Day 1 -- Day 2 -- Day 3 -- Day 4

*****

For today's "30 Days of Me", I'm meant to show you a picture of somewhere I've been to.

Well, I've been lots of places. So how do you choose? I currently live in a very beautiful country, I was born in a beautiful country and I've lived in and traveled in many more over the years. I considered trying to be funny and posting a picture of a toilet; after all, I've been there!

Instead, I think I'll leave you with this:

That is Mont St. Michel in France. It's beautiful there! It is very quaint, it is amazing and it is worth the journey to get there. Should you ever have the chance to be in France, I highly recommend a trip to see this place. You won't regret it!

You Are Beautiful - Winner

2010-10-09T02:00:00.000-07:00

Oh this is one of my favourite things to do. I love giving things away. In this case, I am particularly happy because it is the wonderful "Operation Beautiful" book. I happen to be a big fan of this project because I honestly believe that you can never be told too often how awesome you are.

So, it is with fantastic delight that I used the trust number generator to pick the winners of these two books:

Winner #1 - Mumma Boo

Winner #2 - The Blue Zoo

Congratulations to both of you! Send me and email with your address and I'll get those books out to you ASAP!

Breaking the habit

2010-10-08T01:15:00.000-07:00

**Today is your LAST day to enter to win one of two copies of the "Operation Beautiful" book for you or another beautiful person in your life. Click HERE to enter!**

Day 1 -- Day 2 -- Day 3

*****

And we're back for another "30 Days of Me" post. For day 4 I'm meant to tell you all about a habit I wish I didn't have. Oh my lovelies, how I wish you had all day to sit and digest the mile long list of bad habits that I could divulge. I shall try and keep it brief though and just follow the instructions.

So bad habit........I yell too much.

That may not sound like a habit but it seems to have become one over the years. I yell about the silliest things and at the drop of a hat. I'm not talking about just speaking at a loud volume, I'm talking about yelling at my spawnlets when I could just have a talk with them about something.

Example: Boy Spawn knocks over his glass of milk on the table and instead of commenting on how he should be more careful, I go ape shit and yell at him.

Example: Girl Spawn has been asked to tidy up her room, has gotten distracted and is now busy playing with something in the living room. Instead of asking her to please return to her own den of despair to finish her task, I find myself yelling at her about why she can't just do as she's told the first frickin' time.

Example: I come home from work on a Saturday morning and find The Man has only crawled out of bed an hour ago and has spent the hour sitting on his ass instead of doing anything useful. Because it's a Saturday. And he works HARD all week. Which I know. Instead of just remembering those two things and accepting that he needs to have a rest once in awhile, I turn into a total asshat and yell about all the things he could have been doing and why the hell weren't they done and why does it feel like I have to do every damn thing around here and ohmygodyou'resuchanasshole!!!!

Yeah. It's become a habit. It has become my default setting. And I don't like it.

I have to say though, it is something I've been working on changing!

We are now 8 days into October and I have yelled at my children twice and never at my husband. I'm so proud of myself.

The spawn think that an alien being has taken their mother and moved in because all of a sudden I am talking rationally to them and dealing with things like a normal human being. The Man? I don't think he's noticed because he's not normally around enough to see the difference.

So there you have it. One bad habit and an effort to change.

With a little help from my friends

2010-10-04T01:15:00.000-07:00

**Don't forget to enter to win one of TWO copies of the "Operation Beautiful" book. Open WORLDWIDE! Go HERE to enter!**

Day 1 -- Day 2

*****

Hm. Day 3 of "30 Days of Me" asks me to show you a picture of me and my friends. Here you go.

Picture from nydailynews.com

Obviously I'm the one in the blue bikini.

Honestly it's hard to find a picture of me with any of my friends. For one very good reason - I don't like being in front of a camera. So, I went trolling the pictures of me that various people have posted on Facebook and found this one:

I am the one in the top right corner with the long blond hair, the bottle in my hand and a serious lean going on. I'm pretty sure this was taken on my friend Kelly's 16th birthday. In her basement. We spent a lot of time in basements in those days. Kelly would tell you that that was because we shouldn't have been allowed out in public looking the way we did.

Seriously, what was up with the fashion back then??

Kelly is the one in the bottom left of the picture. The red head propping up the other girl (who, for some reason, I don't remember). In the back with me is Shoned on the left and Nikki C in the middle.

When I moved to Germany in 1993, I didn't know anyone. By the time I been at school for a short time, those 3 were my closest friends. They saw me through a boyfriend or two, the rumour mill at school, the loss of my virginity, the breakup from my first real boyfriend and major love of my teen years, and many a fight with my mother.

We used to get on our bikes on some summer weekends and head into a nearby town to have a treat at the ice cream parlour. HUGE ice creams, with booze on them!

There were gates on the air base where we lived and my mother had a rule that I was not allowed past them, into the area where the single guys were barracked. The four of us ignored that rule time and again and by the time the summer rolled around when I was 16, we were friends with many a single guy. I have a vague memory of me and Shoned almost getting caught at a party in one of the barrack blocks but that might have been our trampy friend, Vicki. The girl wore so much make up that she must have needed a trowel to put it on.

After that summer, I went off to boarding school in England and made new friends. I knew that those three were still back in Germany and I saw them once at a careers fair that both our schools attended and couldn't bring myself to say anything. It's only in retrospect that I realize what a snob I had turned into. We lost touch....until a year or so ago when I found them all on Facebook, the magical tool of reconnection.

Y'all know my story. Kelly is in the army, married to an army guy. Shoned is a vet nurse and with a long term boyfriend. Nikki has a confusing sounding job that I've never really gotten the title for and updated her status with wittiness from time to time. We've all got far different lives than I ever thought we would, but as far as I can tell we're happy.

Those three were some of the best friends I ever had, and possibly the most important ones I had growing up. After all....when you're a teenager, it's your friends that get you through right?

So there you have it. Me....and my friends.

What's in a name?

2010-10-03T01:13:00.000-07:00

For Day 2 of the "30 Days of Me", I am meant to tell y'all the meaning behind my blog name.

Yawn.

It's very simple. It's the name that I came up with in conjunction with the guy who originally set me up in the blog world. It was going to be something like Ramblings of a Busy Mom and instead turned into Mind of a Mad Woman. I try not think about its reflection on my mental state. I know I'm crazy, you know I'm crazy, let's call a spade a freakin' shovel shall we?

After I got torn apart over at The Site Who Shall Not Be Named Again, I seriously considered changing my blog name. After all, all the cool people have awesome blog names.

Badass Geek

Moonspun

Magneto Bold Too

....for a different kind of girl

Twenty Four at Heart

Us and Them

Bacon Is My Lover

Frogs In My Formula

I Like to Fish

Out-Numbered

Striking Keys

.......and SO many more.

I changed my mind. I'm embracing my Mad Woman status and everyone else can suck big hair monkey nuts. I reserve the right to change the look of my blog whenever I want though.

Me. In a bullet point nutshell.

2010-10-01T02:30:00.000-07:00

** Don't forget to enter the giveaway to win one of two copies of the "Operation Beautiful" book. Go HERE **

This is the first of my "30 Days of Me" posts and I'm meant to share a recent picture of myself and 15 interesting facts about myself. The picture I can do easily. Here ya go:

That was taken recently at a place called Monkey Bay, which is about 20 minutes from my house. It was beautiful there!

Now, the 15 interesting facts were a little harder to come up with.

1. I was born in Bermuda. Pink sandy beaches, Portugese man o' war and gorgeous blue water. I got to go back and visit when I was 12 (I think) and it was awesome. Just a beautiful place. I hope one day to visit with the spawnlets.

2. There are 11 years between LilSis and me. For all intents and purposes we grew up as only children, which makes for an interesting dynamic now that we're both adults.

3. I am a huge movie buff. The Man will call me from work to ask me to settle an argument that he and the guys are having. "Honey, you know that movie with the guy who goes to that place where the girl is and they do this....what's it called?" 99% of the time I get it right. He's duly impressed.

4. I share a birthday with the awesome Stevie Nicks & Lenny Kravitz, the annoying Bobcat Goldthwaite (his voice makes me want to gouge my eyes out with a hot spoon) and the crude Matt Stone of South Park fame. I'm not impressed by any of this because I happen to think I'm more awesome than all of them combined, just not as rich.

5. When I get to know you, there's no shutting me up. Until then, I can come across as quite a snob because I can actually be quite shy. This won me the enviable title of "cold, snobby bitch" from The Man's family because very few of them actually took the time to get to know me. You know you want that title too. You can't have it. It's mine. All mine.

6. I hate shopping. Going to a mall and walking around for 2 hours just looking at things is absolute TORTURE to me. I am the kind of girl that goes in with a mission and emerges 20 minutes later with exactly what I was looking for. Window shopping is this girl's equivalent to water torture.

7. Much to my husband's dismay, I could quite happily go my entire life without ever having sex again. I won't...but I could. (You're welcome for this tidbit, oh visiting family members!)

8. I have lived in 7 different countries (Bermuda, Canada, England, Wales, Germany and NZ) and travelled in many more. During my most recent stint in Canada, I lived in 8 different houses in 8 years. It's the curse (or gift) of being a military brat, I have a need to move around.

9. I love, love, LOVE horror movies. However, I can only watch them with all the lights on, a blanket over me, a pillow on my lap and another pillow to put in front of my face to hide behind. Under no circumstances will you get me to watch a horror movie with the lights out. That would just be inviting the boogie man to get me.

10. I have never broken anything. Except dishes. As far as I know, all bones in my body are still in the most excellent condition that they always have been. Of course, now that I have said that, I will fall off a ladder or get beaten by an old woman with a stick and break my arm.

11. I never thought that I would work with old people. I worked in pet stores and had dreams of working with animals, I babysat and knew I would never work with children (shudder) and I went to school and trained as a Legal Secretary...but never did I think I would be happy working with old folks (and disabled people). Turns out, I love it. And I'm good at it!

12. I seem to be horribly addicted to chick lit, vampire novels (especially the ones that use their "big girl words", like J.R. Ward), and books about witches. I'm not sure what's going on. I've read War & Peace. Twice. And yet I find myself reading things like Twilight and getting excited about the sequels. *sigh*

13. I am a Christian but tend to keep that to myself because the vast majority of our friends are not. And neither is The Man. It's not that I'm embarrassed, it's just that I'm afraid of being ridiculed. Silly? Perhaps. Safe? Feels that way.

14. I hate socks. And shoes. I would happily go barefoot all year were it not for safety at work and the fear of losing my toes to frostbite in the winter. Given the choice, it would be me and 50 pairs of flip flops....all the time.

15. I don't like phones. I have a cellphone, but no home line. If you call me, I might answer but I'll try and keep the conversation as short as possible. If you text me or email me, you can bet your perky little ass that I'll be having a full on conversation with you. And no, I don't miss the expression that comes with an actual conversation.

30 Days

2010-09-30T05:00:00.000-07:00

** Have you entered the giveaway for the "Operation Beautiful" books? Go HERE **

There are many, many days when I struggle with what I could (or should) be writing here. Then, the other day, I came across something that a lot of the NZ bloggers that I follow seem to have taken up. It's called "30 Days of Me". The theory is that you are supposed to do 30 days of posts about yourself. In a row. I think it originated on this blog - Pebbles' Blog.

Well, I don't to annoy people by having a post appear every single day and quite frankly I think that I'll probably annoy myself if I did that, so I'm going to do it, but they'll be spaced out a bit. Here's the things you're meant to answer:

Day 01- A recent picture of you and 15 interesting facts about yourself
Day 02- The meaning behind your Blog name
Day 03- A picture of you and your friends
Day 04- A habit that you wish you didn’t have
Day 05- A picture of somewhere you’ve been to
Day 06- Favorite super hero and why
Day 07- A picture of someone/something that has the biggest impact on you
Day 08- Short term goals for this month and why
Day 09- Something you’re proud of in the past few days
Day 10- Songs you listen to when you are Happy, Sad, Bored, Hyped, Mad
Day 11- Another picture of you and your friends
Day 12- How you found out about Blogger and why you made one
Day 13- A letter to someone who has hurt you recently
Day 14- A picture of you and your family
Day 15- Put your iPod on shuffle: First 10 songs that play
Day 16- Another picture of yourself
Day 17- Someone you would want to switch lives with for one day and why
Day 18- Plans/dreams/goals you have
Day 19- Nicknames you have; why do you have them
Day 20- Someone you see yourself marrying/being with in the future
Day 21- A picture of something that makes you happy
Day 22- What makes you different from everyone else
Day 23- Something you crave for a lot
Day 24- A letter to your parents
Day 25- What I would find in your bag
Day 26- What you think about your friends
Day 27- Why are you doing this 30 day challenge
Day 28- A picture of you last year and now, how have you changed since then?
Day 29- In this past month, what have you learned
Day 30- Your favorite song.

So eventually, I will make it through them all. And in between I may even manage to get other posts in.

Thanks for stickin' around y'all.

On a Mission - The 3rd and final chapter..complete with GIVEAWAY!

2010-09-28T21:50:00.000-07:00

Part 1 -- Part 2

So we've talked about our perceptions of beauty. We've talked about the quest for perfect that we all seem to be on, in however small a way.

I'd like to tie those two together today with a video that someone shared with me. It's sad, it brought a tear to my eye. I sat with my 8 year old daughter and watched it. Not because I wanted to scare her, although that may have been an added bonus, but because I wanted to see her reaction and I wanted to have a discussion.

She was horrified. She was saddened. She was confused. She was worried.

She wanted to know why the girls in the video wanted to be so skinny. She asked why their mommies hadn't told them that they were beautiful and smart...."You know, like you tell me all the time Momma!"

I didn't have an answer for her. I still don't.

We talked about why some girls feel like they have to look like that. I let her lead the discussion and eventually we ended up in the inevitable position of talking about how pretty some movie stars and singers are. I Googled some of those "before & after photoshop" pictures of the celebs and she was shocked.

I'm sure there will be more questions to come. I'm sure that as she gets older and listens to some of the girls at school, she will perhaps begin to doubt her own self confidence. I hope that it will be short lived. I hope that I will be able to foster a healthy sense of being in her and that I will never have to watch my daughter starve herself into oblivion.

My hope for my daughter is that she will always be happy with herself, whatever she chooses. I don't just mean with her body, but in her life. I hope never to identify my daughter in an article like the one Dan wrote, it was bad enough to see myself.

Well folks, this is the end of my "On a Mission" series of posts and I would like to give something away to you.

I have TWO copies of the "Operation Beautiful" book to give away. All you have to do is leave a comment telling me who in your life (you or someone else) is beautiful....and why. You can leave ONE comment PER DAY for the duration of the giveaway.

Open to EVERYONE. Contest closes Friday 8th October.

P.S. There's also a giveaway running over at my other blog "Looking For My Feet"...feel free to swing by and enter!

On a mission - Part 2

2010-09-27T05:00:00.000-07:00

Part 1 of "On a Mission" can be found HERE.

**********

The stuff I want to talk about in this second half came about because of yet another post by Dan Pearce at Single Dad Laughing. This post has been well received all around the world. It has made people laugh, it has made them cry and it has opened up many channels of communication. More than 100,000 people have visited the post, it has been shared on Facebook and tweeted on Twitter and sent via email. It took Dan a long time to write and took me a long time to read through because it kept making me stop to think. And cry. The post is called "The Disease Called 'Perfection'". If you haven't yet read it, you should. If you have read it, read it again. Please. Then come back here and we'll talk.

I'll wait.

Did you see anyone you recognize in that post? Did you see yourself in that post?

I did. I saw people from my past and even some from my present. I saw myself from a couple of years ago and even some small bits of my present self floating around. It was kind of sobering.

My mother was there, trying to be perfect for the people around her, never taking time for herself, justifying her husband's behaviour to herself and to everyone around her. She spent many of my formative years trying to please everyone, trying to make everyone happy. If she fell short in that pursuit, you could tell it affected her in a big way. I never really appreciated how much she did for us (none of us did), until I was older with kids of my own. I spent a few years doing this myself.

I'm sure that some people would tell you that my husband was the belittled, unappreciated man. He may even tell you that himself. For some years there, as ashamed as I am to admit it, he worked hard for our family and all I did was pick fights, nag and bully. I was going through a hard time in my own head but wasn't ready to admit it, instead taking it out on him. It's possible that in his desire to hide the imperfection in his marriage, he stayed. Thankfully, we are now in a good, happy place.

We were the couple with debt who still went camping, still went to movies, still got take out....all because we (I) didn't want to say to our friends "sorry, we can't afford it". It's hard when all your friends are making better money, buying better things and having fun....and you don't have the money. You want to seem perfect, you want to fit in, and to tell anyone otherwise is scary.

"Perfection"......it's not all it's cracked up to be. Dan had it right, it's a pandemic. People everywhere trying to something they're not.

I've been that mom, trying to keep up with the other moms. Crafts, play dates, classes, clothes...it all gets to be too much.

I've been that overwhelmed woman driving in her car and considering driving into a wall. I really have. The only thing that stopped me was the fact that my children would then have to live with a very REAL example of how IMperfect their mother was.

It scares me, just as much as it scares Dan and the thousands of people who have shared his words, how focused on being "perfect" we have all become. I am thankful that I am starting to outgrow it. It is partly due to age, I no longer have the incredible NEED to be liked by everyone. My new mantra is "if you don't like me, that ain't MY problem". It is partly due to our new location, New Zealand is not a "keep up with the Joneses" country. But it is mostly due to the fact that I am very aware of how damaging this quest for perfection can be....and I don't want my children to be sucked in. I don't want anyone's children to be sucked in.

So here's my question to you.

WHY?

Why do we feel like we have to be everything, to everyone?

Why do we put so much pressure on our children to look right, act right, be....."perfect"?

Why do we put ourselves through the things we do, to make OTHER people happy?

WHY?

Surely we should be trying to make ourselves happy first. If we aren't happy in our own lives, we can't help anyone else.

I want you all to read Dan's post as many times as it takes to really GET IT. It's important. We need to stop this stupid Perfection Infection. It's ridiculous. And it needs to stop.

It needs to end before anymore children kill themselves, before anymore young women make poor decisions that cost them their lives, before anymore men and women stay in marriages that are making them desperately unhappy.

And please, remember this one thing:

Imperfect is the new perfect.

Also, it's kind of beautiful to be imperfect and have flaws. So embrace yourself. Be yourself. Screw the rest of them.

UPDATE: Dan has posted a response to his own post called "The CURE for 'perfection'". Please go and check it out.

On a mission - Part 1

2010-09-23T17:48:00.000-07:00

What is your definition of beauty?

Is it the faces you see on the street every day -- the elderly people with faces lined with wrinkles and laugh lines, the little kids who smile as they skip past you, the woman in her 20s who is fresh faced and on her way to meet her boyfriend, the mother hurrying past you with 3 kids that looks like she could use a break?

Or is it the faces you see in the media every day - the actresses with the teeny tiny waists and professionally done hair & make up, the singer who just had a baby 2 months ago and has already lost the 60 lbs she gained, the model who is in her 50s but would like everyone to believe that she's aging gracefully despite the many rounds of plastic surgery she's had?

Does it have to be one or the other? Can it be both?

As a female living in this world, I think we are under far more pressure to look good, be thin, have great hair, wear the right clothes and make up....all while managing the rest of our lives. When you flick through a magazine, you don't see pages and pages of men in their various states of dress getting picked apart by the so called "experts". There may be one or two, but it is primarily the women.

Their fashion choices are torn apart, their weight is CONSTANTLY under scrutiny, and ooooh look she's got cellulite! *gasp*shock*horror*

The pictures on those pages, the faces on the commercials....they. are. photoshopped! They aren't real.

The thing is, a lot of the celebs that you see on those pages -- Halle Berry, Charlize Theron, Julia Roberts, the list goes on forever! -- ARE already gorgeous. So why do they need to be enhanced, tweaked and "improved" when their photos are put in a mag?

Why? Because society has a twisted idea of what beauty really is.

I read THIS post by Dan Pearce over at Single Dad Laughing and I found myself nodding along the whole time. It struck a cord with me because for years I have heard, from various sources (not all of them credible), that I can't be hot, I can't be considered beautiful or sexy....because I'm not a size 2 or even a size 12! And I started to believe it! My self esteem sunk SO low that even when my husband, who has loved me at my heaviest weight of 370 lbs, told me that I was beautiful and sexy, I didn't believe him. He couldn't possibly be telling the truth. I don't look anything like those women on tv or in the magazines, so I can't be what he's describing.

I woke up.

No, I don't fit the societal norm of what is hot/beautiful/sexy. No, I'm not a size 2 (nor do I aspire to be. A nice 12 to 14 will do me nicely). No, I don't have the fashionable clothes, the great hair or the gorgeous make up.

BUT!

But I am hot....because my self esteem has started to come up as I lose weight and I really LISTEN to what my husband is telling me.

But I am sexy.....because with that improving self esteem comes self confidence and dammit, I can strut my stuff!

But I am beautiful....because I am a good person, a good mother, a good wife and a good friend and I continue to work on those things on a daily basis.

I am all those things. And so are you. All of you (the men too!).

Don't get me wrong, I know I'm not perfect.....but I don't want to be. I am not trying to be skinny, I am not trying to look like a model. My weight loss journey is purely for my health. I want to be healthy, I want to be alive. Any cosmetic benefits are pure gravy as far as I'm concerned!

As my opinion of myself has improved and the way I see myself has changed, I have thought more and more about how I can make other change the way they see themselves. But where can a person start?

I started with my daughter. I don't want her to grow up with the same body issues that I have been dealing with for years. I want her to be comfortable in her own skin, be confident with who she is and what she looks like and I want her to OWN it.

When she was 5, she came home from kindergarten and stood in front of the mirror and proclaimed herself FAT. I just about moved to Outer Siberia right then and there. Obviously being in contact with the outside world wasn't helping! But that's not the solution is it?

I told her that she was most certainly not fat, she was healthy and beautiful and smart. And I have continued to tell her that. Growing up with a fat mother, she is 50% more likely to have a weight problem herself. Add that to my list of motivations for my own weight loss. As I lose weight and exercise, she sees me making smart and healthy choices and is more likely to do the same. Already, she has entered her first duathlon!

But it's not just my daughter. It's my sister, my mother, my neighbours and my friends. It's strangers out there standing in front of the rows of magazines, sad that they will never look like Drew Barrymore. How do you make a difference with them?

Well. That's when I found out about Operation Beautiful.

This woman started putting up post it notes with messages on them. Encouraging messages. And she stuck them all over the place. People started finding them and then they started leaving some of their own. And it has grown. People all over the world are posting notes where people can find them. I've even been leaving them in various places.

It's a small thing, but it can make a huge difference to someone's day.

So my questions to you are these:

Are YOU beautiful/hot/sexy? (hint: this is a trick question, I already gave you the answer)

How do you foster good self esteem in the girls in your life?

How will you make someone feel better about themselves this week?

**********

Part 2 of "On a Mission"...coming soon!

Yo! Wassup dawg?!

2010-09-20T21:12:00.001-07:00

Hi everyone! I feel like I've been gone forever. I guess I kind of have. It wasn't a planned thing, it just sort of happened that way. It's like I lost all interest in most things internet. Sure I was checking Facebook occasionally to see what colour socks y'all were wearing or how much your neighbour had pissed you off that day and, of course, I was making sure to update my own much watched status so that no one could possibly miss the fact that instead of having spaghetti for dinner we were going to have fettucine. All that interesting stuff that none of us could possibly go a day without knowing. You know the drill.

I even dropped in on Twitter and LiveJournal once or twice. I'm not even sure why I still have a LJ account, to be honest.

The blog thing? I just wasn't feeling it. I knew there was stuff I wanted to talk about. I knew there was stuff I wanted to get off my chest. I even knew that there was a couple of things that I could potentially be funny about. Or they could go over like a lead balloon. The thing is, all that stuff was there.

I. Just. Didn't. Care.

You know why?

Because MONTHS ago, on a whim, I decided to throw myself into the fires of blogger hell and submit my name and blog to these charming folks over at Ask And Ye Shall Receive. See, the idea is that you submit your blog and eventually, when they get through their backlogs of people eagerly awaiting their own slaughter, they will get to you. One of their "experts" goes through your blog with a fine tooth comb laced with nasty and tells you everything you're doing right and EVERYTHING you're doing wrong.

It is beyond me why I even bothered. I guess somewhere in the back of my mind, at the time I put my name into the hat, I was holding onto this dream that they might actually like me. In the months after I sent them my link, I forgot about them. And then? Then they popped up on my Analytics as a new link and I was curious. So curious, that I followed the link and .....

.... found this.

*pause for dramatic effect*

Yeah.

It hurt. It stung. It made me angry and sad and incredibly frustrated all at the same time. Because a big part of me.....knew they were RIGHT!

I HAD started doing a lot of those meme things instead of writing what was in my heart. I had started taking the easy way out and being lazy instead of saying what I wanted to say.

It pissed me off that they were right about so many things. I even responded....and deleted that.

I went through my own archives and deleted a bunch of posts. As far as these people were concerned, I shouldn't be doing this. And so, I didn't.

I lost interest after that.

But then I was sitting here the other night and thinking to myself.....who the HELL do these people think they are? Yes. I was lazy and took the easy way out. Yes. There was a lot of those posts and very few posts that I could look back on and say I was proud of. Yes. But there were a lot of posts I was VERY proud of, and still am, and they didn't even look at them.

These people sit there and pass judgment on the rest of the bloggers and yet we have NO idea who they are, no access to their own blogs to see if they're all hot shit or not and yet we're expected to sit back and take the praise and criticisms as they see fit?

Screw that.

I asked, I received. Fair enough. They didn't like my stuff? Fair enough. But the fact that I let it get to me that much drives me crazy. Screw them!!

This is my blog, I'll write about what I want, when I want, why I want and HOW I want....and if anyone doesn't like it, they don't have to come back.

I hope that after my long absence there is still a few of you here. And I hope you'll stick around, because I'm here to stay!

Guest Poster: "Power Pooper!"

2010-09-06T05:00:00.000-07:00

As much as it pains me that the only posts I've had in the last month are two guest posts...at least they are from the same fantabulous person. Please give Frantic Mommy another warm welcome!!!

**********

Have you had one of those days when:

A. You wish you would have never gotten out of bed.

AND…..

B. You are unsure how your husband makes it through his day without dragging his knuckles like a dang caveman.

A few years ago, I had one of those days. Actually I’ve had MANY days like that in my 21 years of marriage, but this one is forever etched in my beady little brain.

Princess Sara was a baby back then. Cute as a button, sweet as sugar, and the Best.Baby.Ever. She slept through the night at 11 weeks. She rarely cried, smiled a lot, and was as healthy as a horse. She is the perfect child….

with one exception….

….the kid crapped out half her body weight on a regular basis. They weren’t just dainty little poops like her petite little 12 pound body. They were huge, messy, and could choke an ox at 100 yards with the smell. Did I mention she was a “Power Pooper?” Seriously, her turds did not just squeak out, they erupted. The PSI (Poop-per-square-inch) was mind-boggling and even my daycare lady who’d been in the biz 20 years was amazed.

Any-whoo, the day I am referring to did not start off well to begin with. I woke up late, my zipper broke, and apparently I didn’t have another clean pair of pants in the whole stinkin house (fire the laundry lady! Oh wait..that’s me). Like most working parents, I had my morning planned to the nanosecond with ZERO margin for error. That’s when Princess Poopy Pants threw me a curve ball. As I trotted to her room, I could tell half a house away that Mount St. Crap Pants had erupted.

Quickly I scooped her up. I look at her face and note she didn’t look like Winston Churchill so I assumed the “grunting” and “evacuation” portion of her deed was over and all I need to do is to clean up this colossal Mud Slide South of Her Border. I laid her down, opened the Diaper From Hell, and leaned over her to reach for a handful of the 47 wipes it will take to clean up her tiny tushy..

….and disaster strikes.

My Mini Me unleashes Round Two of her Crap-a-Thon. Not a gentle gush, mind you. It comes out with the velocity and style of oatmeal being blown out of a canon. Instantly I am hit with a high-powered load of sh*t and that is rank enough to part one’s hair. In fact, it is IN my hair…on my nose…on my shirt…even on the bedroom door across the room.

I sh*t you not.

I clean her and myself up the best I can (which includes me stripping down to my bra) and take her to Daddy. I quickly inform him his beloved little dumpling has just befouled herself, her room, and her mother.

I was heading for the shower ASAP.

My husband looks puzzled. “Why?”, he asks.

Why? Are you freakin mental??? I have baby crap in my hair!

“Can’t you just comb it out?” he offers.

Ummm ….yeah. RIGHT.

It must be a bitch for him to keep his knuckles from being skinned all the time. Pass the Wooly Mammoth please.

Guest Poster: "What I Know For Sure"

2010-08-02T05:00:00.000-07:00

When I put a call out for people who might want to guest post here, the wonderful B, the Frantic Mommy, Queen of the Kingdom of TIRED, jumped at the chance! She was all "pick me! pick me!" and because she was so insistent and I was a little bit scared she might stalk me, I let her do it.

Alright, I let her do it because I think she rocks and her sense of humour is similar to mine. That statement alone should send you running for the hills, but I hope you'll stick around to learn more about what she knows for sure and when you're done, please go say hello to her and tell her how bad you want to be her friend!

**********

Life can be tough sometimes..

So tough and complicated that it can't be described in a few paragraphs or even several pages.

Then there's those..moments.

Those truisms or observations that are just so obvious you want to smack your forehead and mutter "Duh!"

I guess it's facts and "stuff" you could chalk up to "what I know for sure...."

The following are a few of those.

Some I read years ago, but can't remember where. Some are "Franticmommy-isms", and some came from the lips of my many Girlfriends and Fellow Moms.

All are meant to make you smile...

...and most should be taken with a salty grin:

*Chain letters and mass email "forwards" are just plain annoying. Knock it off.

*On the days you look your worst, they are days you will see the most people you know. Ball cap please?

*Never pass on an opportunity to pee. (as my Norwegian Gramma used to say "Speak now or forever hold your pee...")

*Don't ask a question if you can't handle the answer.

*Cute teenagers only exist on TV.

*Smarting off to your Mom is a lot like yawning and hiccuping at the same time. You are just bound to get hurt in the process.

*Many people have a photographic memory. But many of us are just lacking the film.

*Whoever invented nylons had to be male. No woman would do that to another woman.

*You can pick your friends, you can pick your nose, you can pick your seat at the movies...but you can't pick your relatives.

*I live in my own world. But that's ok. Everyone knows me here.

*Mothers could be the travel agents for guilt trips..it's in our contracts.

SO what do YOU know for sure?

Little bits of random

2010-07-27T02:28:00.000-07:00

I've kind of got thoughts that are bouncing around all over the place, so you're getting a little bit of randomness today. I apologize in advance.

** Yesterday (or July 26th, whenever that may have been for you, depending on where you live) marked an anniversary of sorts for the Mad Woman household. We have now lived in New Zealand for an entire year. It could just be me, but this year seems to have just flown by. I still vividly remember the many teary goodbyes with friends and then sobbing at the airport as I bid goodbye to my father. We're happy here though. The kids are settled and having fun, we've both got jobs and we're doing well as a couple and as a family. No regrets! We do miss everyone though!

** One of the things I have noticed as I lose weight is that aside from my clothes fitting differently and The Man starting to look at me in an even more horny manner, if that is at all possible, is that the wrinkles are starting to show. You see, I don't have as much fat to push them out. So, I am starting to look more my age. There's not many wrinkles, but there's a few. This became rather evident last night at a Zumba class. I had gone with Young Friend who is 20. Part way through the class, we were asked to divide into two different groups - one on each side of the room. As we did do, a woman looked me and suggested "you should probably be on the other side of the class from your daughter". I just about swallowed my tongue as I choked on that one! Clearly a bit of makeup and some anti-aging cream is in order!

** Have you seen that episode of The Big Bang Theory where Penny gives Sheldon a ride somewhere and he notices her "check engine" light is on? That was me the other day. It came on as I left a client's house and I drove around for a little while, happily ignoring it, until that episode popped into my head and I decided I couldn't go home and have The Man go all Sheldon on me, so I stopped and had it looked at. Turns out my car was just about COMPLETELY out of oil (as in, not even showing on the dipstick....which I guess makes ME the dipstick) and rather low on water. It's a wonder I manage to survive from day to day.

** I have realised that the spawnlets are never short of amazing one liners to make me giggle. The latest couple?

Girl Spawn talking about how cold it is in the house: "You know Momma, if we had enough hot water bottles, we could have social heating!"

We're pretty sure she means SOLAR heating which of course has nothing to do with hot water bottles, but I suppose she could mean a bunch of naked, social people cuddled up with hot rubber. You never know with her.

Boy Spawn after calling out to us to come and turn his light off for the night: "I'm done reading!!! *pause* Y'know, all this yelling at night is making my breath hurt!"

I tried to tell him that it's his throat but he maintains it is his breath that hurts and not the tube in his neck. I'll have to take his word for it.

** It occurred to me the other day how much I'm beginning to enjoy having women as friends. In the past, I've spent more of my time with guys because they can usually get ready quickly, don't bitch a lot and can skull a beer as fast as I can. But in the last few years, after a couple of drama queens and queen bees were left behind, I have begun to enjoy the company of women a bit more. It's a strange feeling. Really strange. Or maybe it's the women who are strange. Yeah, we'll go with that.

** Would any of you be interested in doing a guest post for me? I'd like to have a guest poster on a semi regular basis and would love if you'd drop me a line. Anything goes!

So, what random thoughts are floating through your brain these days?

Sometimes you just need to close your eyes and dream of a beach

2010-07-22T02:34:00.000-07:00

There are just some days when I seriously start to question my sanity. You know those days where it seems like you're going the wrong way against the traffic all freaking day? The days where if your children walk the wrong speed or your husband breathes too fast, the ones where if you have to talk to one more person you are going to silently be digging their eyes out with spoons...in your head of course.

Today was one of those.

7:15 am - Alarm rings. Hit snooze.

7:25 am - Rings again. Stupid machine. Hit snooze again.

7:35 am - Rings. Again. Shit! Now I'm late getting up. Stupid machine. It really needs to be more assertive.

"Kids! Get out of bed. Now."

"No. Now. Not in 10 minutes. Get. Up. NOW!!"

7:45 am - Contemplate a shower but decide that long pants will hide leg stubble, headband will disguise some of the oily (gag) hair, and honestly I don't smell. Much. Get dressed.

"Why aren't you dressed yet? Get dressed! GAH! Are you TRYING to upset me this morning?!"

Thankfully neither of them is dumb enough to answer in the affirmative.

8:00 am - Wonder why The Man is sitting on his arse in the living room instead of making sandwiches. Like he does every other morning. Or pouring their cereal. Like every other morning. Stomp around and make unhappy noises til he does it.

"Would you two PLEASE get yourselves READY?!?!"

8:30 am - Finally. Two kids ready, bags packed, shoes on and heading to the car. Now, where are my keys? You've got to be kidding me. *sigh*

8:45 am - Usher Boy Spawn into his classroom to offer his teacher a rather humble apology for his unusually appalling behaviour yesterday. Beat a hasty retreat before I start to feel worse because she was so disappointed in him as it is not like him. It must be a full moon. On Jupiter.

8:50 am - Head off to see a man about a penis. Can't get iPod to work in the car. Consider throwing a temper tantrum but realise there is not enough room to do this justice, so settle for a loud scream. It's winter. No one can hear me with the windows up. I think.

9:30 - 11 am - Build up my arm muscles maneuvering a 350 pound man around in a hoist & wheelchair. Get wet showering him because he thinks it's bloody hilarious to squirt me with the shower. Ass.

11 am - 12 pm - Visit home to change into some gym clothes and search out yet another pair of dry shoes. Ponder the value of keeping a pair of rubber boots and a raincoat in my car for work but realise it would be cheaper to just clean his false teeth with vinegar.

12:30 - 2:15 pm - Young Friend came with me to the gym. Treadmill tortured me. Rowing machine laughed at me and then made me play some stupid target game that I sucked at. Weights left me feeling like I'd been run over by a truck. Dripping in sweat by the time I was done, I needn't have bothered changing my clothes.

2:30 pm - Wet Day early pick up at school. Picked up spawnlets. Joked with Girl Spawn.

"If you've got an orange slip in your bag, you can just start walking home now. Forget getting in the car."

2:35 pm - Watched in horror as Girl Spawn dissolved into tears, spluttering that she didn't want to walk home and she was sorry but she had a RED slip (for REALLY bad behaviour) in her pocket. Apologized, listened to story and got upset.

Turns out, Girl Spawn (8 years old) was assigned work. Got up to sharpen pencil. Took forever doing that. Bell rang for lunch. Off she went. Substitute teacher found her after a while, asked if she'd finished her work, she said "yes" and then remembered that no, she actually hadn't. Sub decided Girl Spawn had been intentionally deceptive and handed her a red slip and 15 minute detention for tomorrow. Also, she didn't get her lunch. At all.

3:00 pm - Decided this punishment was bunk. At most deserved an orange slip for not finishing work on time. Red slips are for bullying, stealing, intentional deception....not forgetfulness on the part of an admittedly unfocused, slow working, procrastinator. Went in search of Principal.

3:10 pm - Had full on, and majorly embarrassing, meltdown in Principal's office. Big tears. Bigger sobs. Even bigger blush from the humiliation of crying over something so silly. Sue me, I cry when I get mad. And I was mad that it had happened. Slow and daydreamy she is, a liar she is not.

4:00 pm - 5:30 pm - Kids at swim lessons. I quietly read my book until an obnoxious Irish lady approached to tell me that I was sitting in her seat. Really? I'd been sitting there for 20 minutes. Seems she'd gone to help her son change and now she was back and wanted her seat. Fuck you lady. I just cried in the school Principal's office, I am not afraid to bitch you out at the pool. And I'm not moving.

6:00 pm - Home for a much needed shower. Headband is no longer even remotely disguising the oily (gag) hair. And now I do smell. Yum.

6:30 pm - Head off to see a man about an enema. For him. Times three. Not only do I NOT get sprayed with a shower, but I don't get shit on either. Bonus!! Things are looking up.

The rest of the evening went spectacularly. Took me three tries to start my car when I left Enema Guy's house. Almost ran over a cat in the grocery store parking lot though I can't for the life of me figure out where the cat would have come from. No houses nearby. Came home to find Boy Spawn asleep, Girl Spawn tired and grumpy, The Man tired and grumpy and STILL suffering from The Man Flu and the house looking like a bomb site because I haven't had time to do anything today.

So.

How was YOUR day?

Lessons in being cool...trust me, you need them!

2010-07-18T02:13:00.000-07:00

I've noticed a few things lately, and I think I need to put on my teacher hat for awhile. So sit back, relax and take some notes people!

Lessons In Being Cool

(or Five Ways to Pretend You're Not As Stupid As You Really Do Look Right At That Moment)

1. When you pull up to the supermarket and realise, just in time, that you have forgotten to bring your purse or wallet with you, do NOT just pull out of your parking space to go home and retrieve it. This will make you look stupid. First, pull out your cellphone, put it to your ear and carry on a conversation with yourself. Anyone watching will be non the wiser. And you can pretend that you've been called away to something urgent, sending your shopping trip to the bottom of your already busy schedule. (Note: If it is summer and you have your windows down, make sure to mute or switch off your phone before attempting this. Should someone happen to call while you are carrying on your fake conversation, you WILL look more stupid than you did already.)

2. If you happen to have gotten from your car, all the way around the store, and made your way to the cash register before realising that you are seriously lacking a way to make payment, then the cashiers will likely be looking at you with contempt as they contemplate the potential ire of the 7 people lined up behind you as you run to look for your wallet. To avoid this, I suggest a solid patting down of your clothing and a good rummage through your purse as you frantically "search" for your wallet, knowing full well it is sitting on your coffee table next to the half empty bottle of Jack Daniels from last night. Once your pretend search is completed, sigh heavily and tell the bored looking teen behind the cash register that your idiot husband must have taken your wallet when he went to go buy his beer and that you'll be screaming at him later. Apologize for his stupidity and assure her you'll be back once you've rammed his head up his ass as punishment.

3. Assuming you were not stupid enough to leave your wallet anywhere, and are still standing at the cash register watching the emo behind the counter bite the nails on her overly polished hands, then you may proceed to the next step - paying. But wait! Emo pauses from her crunchy snack to inform you, loudly, that she's incredibly sorry but your card has been declined. Resist the urge to smack her. Ignore the titters from the people behind you, they're just relieved it's not them. Although you know that it is entirely your fault that there is no money in the account (those jeans were just screaming your name!), the key to avoiding humiliation in this situation is to start cursing your spouse's name. "Stupid man! I can't believe he used the debit card without telling me. AGAIN! Ugh. I can't believe this. What a jackass. He's gonna pay for this" And so on, and so on. Please avoid blushing....this does not lend itself to supporting your credibility.

4. As you walk down the sidewalk and trip over your own feet due to combination of feet the size of boats and a propensity towards clumsiness thanks to a genetic abnormality passed down from your father (known in scientific circles as "Clumsy Ass Syndrome"), do NOT glance around sheepishly and hope that no one noticed you. I guarantee they have. Instead, play cool (that is, after all, the name of the game right?) and look angrily at the ground while simultaneously shouting "Sonofbitch! Stupid city can't get anything fixed! GRR!" and then carry on walking.

5. You've been shopping at a big mall, been to the movies at a giant cinema complex or been to a theme park that isn't smart enough to label its parking lots with easy to see signs. You thought you'd picked out some landmarks but now that you've come back carrying those big bags of new clothes, your damn car seems to have been moved. I have one thing to tell you....Sucks. To. Be. You! Sorry, I have no constructive advice. Unless you have a high tech tracking device on our car that will not only locate you car but guide you to it, you're screwed. And you WILL end up standing in the parking lot, looking around, trying desperately to act like you're just waiting for someone. There is no way out of this one.

Now, I'm not saying that I've ever had an issue with any of these things.....I just thought that some of you could benefit from this knowledge which I came by from watching other people do these things. Not me. Nope. Definitely not me.

Blood & guts galore

2010-07-15T04:15:00.000-07:00

Girl Spawn had to have dental surgery yesterday. She had hypoplasia on her back 4 molars and as it was severe, we were told they should come out. Rather than have them out at the dentist where they would have to inject her with freezy stuff, they chose the hospital.

We arrived at the hospital, as directed, at noon and got sent to sit in the waiting area/playroom. She was meant to be first in line at 1:30pm but as the afternoon wore on, it quickly became clear that something had been changed.

As Girl Spawn played, read books and practiced her cartwheels out in the courtyard, I tried my best not to throw up. The antiseptic smell was strong and I could almost taste it in the back of my throat. I've never liked the smell of a hospital and do my best to avoid them. Unfortunately, she needed this procedure and she wanted me with her.

I tried not to dwell on the fact that my 8 year old would soon be sent off to sleep with the help of a general anesthetic. I tried not to think too much about the risks involved in any procedure where a GA is used. I did my best to recall what everyone had been saying about how well THEIR children did in the same sorts of situations. I watched my daughter, skipping around the courtyard and singing the tune (almost) of her favourite Lady Antebellum song, as she just carried on with her day without a worry.

At 3:00pm they came to get us, got her into her gown and explained a little bit about what would happen. Then we sat there. And waited. Again.

By 3:45 I was frustrated, she was tired and bored and we were both ready to go home. This is also when they decided they were ready for us. We were taken into the pre-op area to wait for the anesthetist. While we waited, the nurses decided to make a spectacularly stupid (in my not so humble opinion) decision and wheel the first little girl out of the OR into recovery and put her directly across from us. This might not have been an issue except for the fact that the girl was screaming her frackin' head off because someone had neglected to call her mother before she woke up and she was now disoriented and scared. This situation scared the crap out of Girl Spawn and she started to cry and question whether it was going to be that way for her. Thankfully, it wasn't.

Surgery started at 4, I was called to recovery at 4:40 and I was able to be there as she woke up. Quietly. *breathe sigh of relief*

10 minutes later we were back in her room and, chipmunk mouth aside, she was doing ok. Then she needed to go to the bathroom. Cool. Done.

By the time she got back to her bed, she'd lost all colour from her face. The minute she leaned back, that was it. Her blood pressure dropped. Big time. Her eyes rolled back in her head, she was in and out and she was pale & cold.

Did you know what normal blood pressure is for an 8 year old?
Systolic = 112 to 118, Diastolic = 74 to 78

How about normal pulse rate for an 8 year old?
75 to 105 beats per minute, with the average being 90.

Girl Spawn dropped to a blood pressure of 82/53 and a pulse rate of 74. To say the nurses were concerned would be a bit of an understatement.

First moment of panic? CHECK!

As they worked to stabilize her BP, they informed that she was not allowed to go home until she'd had something to eat & drink....and kept it down. We'd already seen the first girl go home. She was even smiling! So, surely this would be easy. Right?

HA!

Her mouth wouldn't stop bleeding. It ran down her throat. It upset her stomach. She puked. 250mls of mostly blood with a bit of saliva. Awesome.

Blood pressure still down.

7pm, the third little girl gets to go home. Smiling.

Try again with the food & drink.

Nope.

Another 250 mls of mostly blood and some water. Fan-freakin-tastic.

Blood pressure still down. Nurses suggesting ice water & ice chips to help settle stomach. Girl Spawn looking awful. Me? Worried.

By 8:30pm she had thrown up a third time (another 250 mls), was still pale and the nurses FINALLY got a doc to prescribe anti-nausea meds. Her BP was finally coming up though!

It got better from there, she finally kept food & drink down and started to look human.

At 10:30pm, we were discharged. Ten and a half hours in the hospital was a bit much for us. She's sleeping peacefully now and tomorrow will bring more recovery adventures.

And me? I hope it will be a long, long time before I have to smell the inside of that hospital again.

Celebrating Eight

2010-07-11T03:09:00.000-07:00

It was quiet in the house last night. Relatively. The Man had left for his night shift (stay away stalker dudes!) and the spawn were tucked in tight, dreaming of sunny days and lollipops. I could hear the dishwasher running in the kitchen, the heat pump desperately trying to warm up my living room before I turned into an icicle and Girl Spawn was snoring loud enough that you would think there was a car in the other half of my house. CSI Miami was on the TV and I was trying not to gag every time Horatio Cane turned sideways, slid his sunglasses off and fed me a cheesy one liner.

All the while, the one thought that kept rudely shoving aside all others was that my little girl would be a tad bigger today. That one thought, that little piece of information, was making me restless. I was preoccupied with the realisation that today would usher in a new age.

Today, a birthday will be celebrated.

Today, Girl Spawn turns 8.

As I sat here yesterday evening and watched her interact with her little friend (we had a sleepover. I'm sure you can imagine my excitement!), I was struck by how grown up she seems in some ways and yet so like the little girl she still is in other ways. They giggled about boys and which ones were cute but when Boy Spawn brought up the subject of kissing, they both replied with a loud "EWWW" and eased my mind. I'm not ready for boys yet. Will I ever be?

The last year has not been an easy one for any of us but if I can say one thing about it, it would be that I am proud of how my beautiful daughter has handled herself.

Just two weeks after her birthday last year, we packed up our things into just a few suitcases and left all our friends and family behind so that we could move across the world. As she hugged her friends, I could see her holding back the tears. As she waved goodbye to her grandfather at the airport (and watched me blubbering like an idiot), they still didn't fall. Through school changes and more, my girl has shown a strength that would make many adults envious.

As she grows and learns, life is not always sweet however. Her attitude can be mighty sucktastic some days and she still greatly enjoys torturing her little brother. She will scream how she hates me in one breath and tell me in the next that she's sorry and actually loves me a lot and could she please, pretty please, have a biscuit and a glass of juice. She slams doors and flings herself down on her bed, but can be found reading a book to her brother in an effort to keep him out of my hair for a few minutes.

The good from this girl always, always FAR outweighs the bad....and the bad is only minor.

Saturday was her birthday party. We invited a bunch of her friends, rented a court at the local indoor sports centre, and supplied some food. For two hours they ran around like maniacs, screaming at the top of their lungs and occasionally taking a break to see how much popcorn and chips they could fit into their mouths before washing it all down with soda. I only needed a few aspirin to get rid of the headache later.

When we sent out the invitations for her party, she made a special request. I was to put a note into the envelopes for the parents. You see, Girl Spawn decided there was nothing she particularly wanted, and nothing she absolutely NEEDED, so this was to be a "no gift" party. Instead, she wanted to collect donations in a jar. These donations would then be split equally between the SPCA and the missions (for World Vision etc) that her school runs.

In the end, she ended up with just over $100. It makes me proud to know that this is the kind of girl she is becoming.

I am honoured, blessed and deliciously happy to be known as her mother and can only hope that as she gets older, she will want to continue this open and honest relationship that we currently have.

My wonderful daughter - may you have the happiest of birthdays today, and many more to come. I love you dearly and will try not to embarrass you too much in front of your friends as you get older. Note that I said TRY....I can't promise anything. I am, after all, merely human. (Plus, I think it's in the mothering contract that I have to embarrass you on a semi regularly basis over the next 60 years)

The importance of remembering

2010-07-09T02:31:00.000-07:00

I stood and folded laundry while she had her shower. She chatted away to me and asked me questions. She had an infectious giggle that seemed like it traveled from the tip of her toes, up through her body, before finally bubbling out of her mouth. She told me about her puppy and the games she liked to play with it. She told me naughty jokes that she'd learned from her brother.

As I readied myself to wash her hair, she started to clean her feet. Again. It was the fifth time she'd done this, but I didn't say anything. I knew that at her age it was sometimes hard to remember so many steps and which ones were already completed.

For the next few minutes I listened to her tell me about a fight she'd had with her brother. He's younger than her and doesn't think that he should have to listen to his big sister. She thinks otherwise. She called him a couple of names but I kept my thoughts to myself. It was the third time that morning that I'd heard the story, but it seemed to make her feel better to tell it. Besides, it was almost breakfast time and while she ate, I'd be able to busy myself with my own thoughts.

I felt like I should sit and talk to her some more. She'd been confined to the house a fair bit, thanks to the cold she'd had the week before, so she seemed like she needed the time. On the other hand, it was as if the more we talked, the more confused she got.

I suppose that eventually I will get used to this sort of thing. In my line of work I see a lot of people like this. This woman is in her 80s and, while she can remember a lot that happened 10 or 20 or even 50 years ago, she often has trouble remembering anything from 5 minutes ago. It makes me wonder whether it frustrates her or not......whether she even realises what's going on. It must also be hard on the families of these folk. Hard to visit and know that there's a big chance that you won't be recognised. Hard to spend time with someone knowing that no matter how special the time is, the memory of it may be gone 20 minutes later.

I hope that as I get older, no matter how frail and broken my body may get, I will retain my mental faculties. I hope that my family will be around to love me, no matter how forgetful I end up.

I hope that you will hug the old folks in your family and remember that although they may sometimes forget the times they've spent with you, that they still love you. Learn from them, support them, be there for them.

As a parent.....

2010-07-04T20:06:00.000-07:00

As parents, we are privileged to watch our children grow, make friends, explore the world and learn new things. We try to do our best for them and help them along the way, all the while realising that there are just some things that we cannot get involved in. We help them traverse the unknown territory that is growing up and hope that we don't screw up too much along the way.

As parents, we hurt to see our children sick or in pain and know that, although we'd dearly love to try, there is actually very little we can do to take it away and make it all better. To see them bullied at school, or fall on the sidewalk, or have a medical issue - it makes us ache inside with the need to fix it.

As parents, we can sometimes struggle through the day as our children drive us up the wall and fill us with the desire to drink an entire bottle of wine in one sitting. As they whine, bug, fight with each other and mess up the house as they follow around behind us like a mini tornado, we can sometimes be found hiding in the pantry, taking deep breaths and counting to 10 in an effort to curb the adult temper tantrum that is brewing. Our patience can be tested regularly throughout the day and we often look forward to bed time when we can look at them and think "it's a good thing they're cute".

As parents, our hearts can swell with pride with every achievement and milestone, no matter how big or small. We save art work and certificates, we cheer from the sidelines at sports games while wishing for the other team to lose, we diligently turn up to school plays and parent/teacher meetings and we cheer when the report cards come home (assuming they don't have "should definitely attend summer school" written all over them).

Over the years I have watched, with fascination and dread, as the children have grown. I have been through everything I've just mentioned....even just in the last week.

As I watched Girl Spawn laying in bed sniffing away, I wanted nothing more than to make it better....if for no other reason than the fact that this stuffy nose that she's been fighting seems to have caused her to snore like a wild boar and it reverberates through the house.

When Hotty Hubby was trying to sleep before a night shift and the spawnlets were busily screaming at each other and steadfastly ignoring me, I locked myself in the bathroom and counted to 50 in the hopes of bypassing the urge to smack their heads together and lock them in the garage before finishing the bottle of wine in my fridge.

Every time one of them comes home from school with a certificate for doing something great, or a green slip for great behaviour, we are very proud. We enforce homework every night, we encourage reading and we attend all our parent/teacher interviews in an effort to better understand what is happening in our children's lives.

When we first moved here, we enrolled the kids at a local public school. It was easy, it was close (although everything in this town is close) and it was cheap. Girl Spawn settled in ok, made a few friends, but it was nothing spectacular. Boy Spawn, on the other hand, did not fare so well. He has always been a very outgoing child and has been able to make friends with just about anyone. Yet, somehow, this didn't happen. He's not really drawn to the rough and tumble boys. He is happy to BE rough & tumble, but not all the time. Neither of them really settled very well, so we started looking at other options.

Now they attend a local Christian school. It was a stretch for Hotty Hubby as he's rather the type that fears being smited should they set foot in a Holy place, but he's going with the flow for now. It's only got a roll of about 100 kids, compared to the 300+ at the previous school. They wear a nicer (and more expensive) uniform and there are only 5 classes. The kids have settled amazingly well and they couldn't be happier.

During the last two weeks of June, the school ran a Talent Quest. In the past, when I've been involved in a school Talent Quest, it has been only the kids that thought they had a talent worth sharing that bothered to enter. At this school, it was mandatory for ALL kids to enter at least 3 categories. Their philosophy (being a Christian school) is that all the kids have something to offer.

I wish I'd thought to take pictures of the work that was produced. It was amazing! 7 year olds painting beautiful pictures, metal work, wood work, sculptures, and more. Absolutely fantastic.

Boy Spawn (almost 6) chose to enter in a Connect 4 playoff, do some baking, enter the handwriting contest, play soccer and make a craft. He ended up coming second in the playoff, first in handwriting and soccer for his age category, first in the baking in the "slices" category for his Lolly Cake, and he made a terrarium filled with cactuses (cactii?).

Girl Spawn (almost 8) chose to enter in the handwriting contest, do some art, make some jewellery and do some photography. Let me tell you, I don't think she's ever going to be an artist (not in the painting/drawing sense anyway) or excel at jewellery making...but she sure had fun! Where she DID excel is the photography. She won FIRST place for her photo for best use of lighting. It's amazing what a kid can achieve when you let them loose in a graveyard with a digital camera (she chose the place). Here's the winning shot:

As a parent, I have spent a lot of time feeling incredibly proud of my children this past little while and feeling very, very honoured to be their mother.

What you love best & dislike the most about being a parent?

Cookin with CSN Stores Giveaway

2010-06-22T23:11:00.000-07:00

If this just popped up in your reader, I apologize but this is an old giveaway. Sad thing is, I was doing a cleanup on my blog and deleted my giveaway post, and it's meant to be on my blog for a year, so I'm having to repost it. Comments will be closed. And Jamie from CSN, if you're reading, I'm sorry for the mix up.... :-(

If you haven't discovered CSN Stores yet, you need to go and check them out. They have all sorts. Kitchen stuff, toys, accessories, bed linen and beautiful headboards (which I would love to have).

Recently, the wonderful Jamie from CSN emailed me to ask if I'd like to do a giveaway and I jumped at the chance because it gives me a chance to show my appreciation for you all. I was able to pick a couple of items I thought you might all enjoy and this time they are all about food. I love food and I am starting to enjoy creating healthy dishes. I've lost 49 lbs and I'm keen to lose more, so food has become all important to me.

So what can you win?

First up, we have the cool looking Hamilton Beach Food Processor. This baby could make your life so much easier! It holds 10 cups of stuff and you can make just about anything in it. You want it, you want to make it yours!

But wait! There's more!

You also have the chance to win these fabulous baking dishes from Le Creuset. Ooohhh Ahhh. Gorgeous aren't they? I'm rather partial to this shade of blue, so I'd like them myself but living in New Zealand kind of makes that difficult for me. Luckily, all you folks in the US & Canada are eligible. YAY!

So get those entries in!

Mandatory entry : Tell me what you'd make with either of these things.

Extra entries: Leave as many comments as you want!

**CONTEST NOW CLOSED!! **

Winner of Food Processor - June from 3! A Charm
Winner of Le Creuset Dishes - my friend Allie

Both winners chosen using a Random Number Generator

This may be why I prefer typing

2010-06-22T16:26:00.000-07:00

A couple of weeks ago, my lovely friend Mumma Boo tagged me for this little project and I kept forgetting about it. Odd really, considering that I've been wondering what the heck I could write about. She had been tagged by someone else who had been tagged by Robin from The Not-Ever-Still Life for a Handwriting Project. I am finally getting around to it.

I love, love, LOVE getting handwritten notes. Just last week I found myself standing in my kitchen, tears running down my face, because I had received a handwritten letter from a very dear friend back in Canada. She could have told me all the same things in an email but it was SO much more special in a letter. Plus, it gave me some justification for checking my mailbox eleventy million times during the day. I swear most of my exercise comes from walking from my front door to my mailbox, over and over again.

My mother and father have had the same style of handwriting for as long as I can remember. Mum's is very easy to ready, almost printing with a little flair thrown in. Dad is full on cursive writing, but still easy to decipher.

My husband is left handed and, like most left handed people I've met, has atrocious handwriting. The one exception to this was one guy I went to school with who was not only left handed but had neater handwriting than any girl I'd met. My daughter is left handed and it still remains to be seen how her's will turn out. Boy Spawn is right handed (YAY!) but is only just coming up to 6, so I don't care.

Me? Well. Just like my fashion sense, my handwriting samples are a bit of an odd-ball collection. I have the stuff I use when I'm writing for the kids, the one I use when writing to the in-laws, the kind I use when I'm trying to look cool and then there's the professional job application type stuff. Oh. And my scrawl.

So Robin's idea was to have a look at the handwriting of all these people we read every day, but we only ever get to see their stuff in Times, Arial or, heaven forbid, Comic Sans. Wanna have a look?

The "rules" say to write down the following stuff, then take a picture & post it for y'all to see before tagging a few of you so that I can see what your scrawl looks like.

1. Name/Blog Name
2. Right Handed, Left Handed or Both
3. Favourite letters to write

4. Least favourite letters to write
5. Write: The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog.
6. Write in caps: CRAB
HUMOR
KALEIDOSCOPE
PAJAMAS
GAZILLION
7. Favourite song lyrics
8. Tag 7 people
9. Any special note or drawing

As you probably can't read my bubbly, "cool" writing, the people I tagged are:

Aunt Juicebox @ Bacon Is My Lover
Bossy Betty @ BOSSY BETTY
Angela Noelle @ Striking Keys
Dual Mom @ We're At Dad's That Week
Adrienzgirl @ Think Tank Momma
Gun Diva @ Just Another Perfect Day
Adia Belle @ I'm Addicted

What's really sad is that even after that one measly page, my hand hurt. I definitely prefer typing.

The NNNs came to get me!!

2010-06-14T00:30:00.000-07:00

If you are (un)lucky enough to have me on your Facebook, then you will have perhaps noticed my incessant blathering about how sick I've been and oh, poor me, won't someone please take pity on me and so on and so on. I woke up Friday morning with what can only be described as the head cold from the deep, frozen corners of Hell. To be honest, at first I thought I just had some sniffles. I donned my sexy mask to prevent all the old people from catching my bugs and headed off to work.

Catwalk sexy, no?

By Friday evening, in between blowing gallons of snot out of my nose and wiping my eyes so often that I looked like a stoned hippie, I had come to the conclusion that perhaps I had so upset my husband that he had hired some Nasty Nasal Ninjas (NNNs) to come and inject a half ton of liquid into my head. I spent Saturday gradually feeling worse and contemplating the possibility that the only remedy for this malaise would be to chop off my head.

I feel that there should be a department to write to when sick and feeling like there is a distinct possibility you might drown in a pool of your own snot. Once contacted, this department would dispatch a rescue crew armed with suction bulbs and Netti-Pots to do away with the NNNs.

Every time I started to feel better and consider actually resembling a human being for a while, I would have to go to work. As a Support Worker, I am in contact with the elderly and disabled. If I don't wear my sexy mask to cover my mouth & nose and I breath on them, cough on them, sneeze on them or spit in their dinner, then they will also get the plague. Apparently this could be grounds for punishment, so I kept donning the mask of gorgeousness.

Here's the thing with these masks. If you wear glasses, they are a pain in the huge, dimply arse. They fog up and leave you with all the limited visibility but none of the awesomeness of a sauna. (But less sweaty...that's a plus). Also, while wearing one of these Lone Ranger masks, you are essentially breathing in your own disease filled air. Quite aside from the obvious grossness of this, it leaves your face feeling rather ...um... moist. Moist. Moist. (Is anyone cringing at that word?) Moist. (Muahaha!) I came out of each and every house, ripped my mask off and felt like a bloodhound had just given me a tongue bath. It was gross. And it did nothing to alleviate the watering eyes and runny nose.

Super. Attractive.

As client after client laughed at me, and I worked my way through an entire jumbo box of tissue, I began counting down the hours (minutes!) until 8:45 p.m. Sunday night when I could collapse in a gelatinous puddle.

(How's my pity party workin' so far?)

Monday morning I woke up feeling refreshed. Two nights of at least 11 hours sleep will help with that. I promptly overdid it with exercise but oh holy hell - how wonderful it is to be able to breathe. Except that now I can smell my spawn. And the hubby. *sigh*

In other, not so sickly, news - Hotty Hubby will be working nights for awhile. While many people would be unhappy about this, it makes me rather happy. I get an entire queen size bed to myself for 5 out of 7 nights. He'll sleep while the kids are at school and I'm at work. We'll get just as much time together as we do now...but he gets $2 extra per hour AND overtime. Can we say WOO! ???

So how are you all feeling? Did I manage to pass on the Head Cold From Hell to any of you? Give it a whirl sometime...I promise you'll feel like shit.

8 years and he hasn't killed me.....yet

2010-06-01T20:43:00.000-07:00

We were young, HE was skinny and I was 8 months pregnant. My dad had a shotgun pictured in his head and we'd invited 40 of our friends and family to join us at a local park to stand in the blazing hot sun.

I forgot my bouquet at home in my mad rush to look as presentable as possible and my cousins ran around the park illegally picking flowers so that I had something to hold in my hands that might hide some of the massive expanse of belly.

One set of his grandparents were counting down the minutes til we could get to the drinking, the other set counting down the minutes til they could remove themselves from the travesty of their golden boy marrying the slut who had the audacity to get knocked up.

He went a ghostly shade of white, rocked back and forth on his feet and looked like he was going to pass out; I went a pretty shade of red and tried to ignore the baby kicking her feet into my cervix in a way that made me picture David Beckham (and not in a good way).

His best man looked handsome, my maid of honour looked irritated and bored. Turns out we were keeping her from a very important date. Yes. My wedding day and the ho bag had scheduled a date with her current bit of fluff while her husband was out of town with their daughter.

We honoured his mother with a picture of her on the table near us, sad that she wasn't there to share the special day with us - she'd been gone 13 years already. We remember my mother and sister, so far away in another country, unable to share the day with us.

We said our vows, taking out the bit about obeying because really, WTF?

In what seemed like seconds (or was it years?), it was over and we were no longer singles but a Mr & Mrs. We were a pair, a couple, a match. We were now tied to each other and were our own mini family. Soon, we would be three. We signed the book (I'm still trying to figure out who owns my soul now) and went to pose for more pictures.

We looked like we were 12 back then. Young. Innocent (we'll ignore the huge pregnant belly, shall we?). Looking happily to the future.

I didn't get my big white wedding with 15 bridesmaids, an open bar and dancing on the tables to kick ass music pumped out by an average DJ so hopped up on coke that he couldn't tell the difference between Jay-Z and Kanye.

But I did get my husband, my family and my friends all together for one of the most special days of my life.

Eight years on and we're still married. We're still a couple, a twosome, a force to be reckoned with. We've made it past the birth of two children, a year of being separated, "friends" causing trouble, real friends trying to help, multiple house moves and the 7 year itch, and we have yet to throw anything heavy (or at least with any accuracy).

When I think back on the last 8 years, I can think of a few things that might have sent a lesser woman running for the hills:

He snores like a water buffalo
~ Thankfully, I snore like a freight train so we tend to cancel each other out.

He rolls himself up like a cocoon in the blankets at night, leaving me to freeze my ass off on the other side of the bed.
~ I'm not opposed to elbowing him, kicking him or pushing him off the bed and then retrieving the blankets to regain my warmth.

He makes such a smell in the bathroom after work some days that it would make anyone not "in the know" think that something had died in there.
~ He's willing to de-tribble the shower drains for me so that I don't puke everywhere. Which he would also clean up for me, if asked.

He is irritatingly laid back so much of the time that it just makes you want to scream.
~ I'm high strung enough for the two us.

He hates to clean, doesn't like to cook, leaves clothes everywhere and would rather sleep than do anything productive around the house.
~ Same here.

And then I got to thinking about other stuff:

He is the one who keeps me going from day to day.

He is the one I look to in good times and in bad.

He is the one I look forward to spending my life with.

He is the one who makes me feel good about myself - even on my bad days.

He is the one who loves me - even when I am at my most UNloveable.

~ And for ALL of that (and so much more), I love that man.

So, to the love of my life, the man of my dreams and the better half of me.... I wish you a very Happy 8th Anniversary. I look forward to many more of these days and I'm glad I have you in my life. Even if you do snore. And smell.

Soapbox Saturday

2010-05-29T02:33:00.000-07:00

Welcome, peoples, to the first of many Soapbox Saturdays where we take a topic and air our many and varied opinions on topics that have the potential to be smokin' hot.

This week? The sexualisation of our little girls compared to days gone by and how the fashion world, Hollywood and parents play a part. This topic was brought about after reading THIS POST by Emily at Wheels on the Bus, and watching the video (below) that was in that post. I was so shocked that I had to say something more than what I said in her comments section.

So grab a button, link up with Mr. Linky and let us all know how you feel.

My first reaction to that video was one of sadness. Sad that adults had taken girls so young and taught them to move like that. Dressed them in teeny tiny little outfits and taught them to move their hips in a way that would rival the skanks down at your local strip joint.

My next was anger. I was angry that those parents had the audacity to sit and justify it all in the name of dance. Fine, I get that the video was "not intended to be viewed by millions" but isn't that a little beside the point now? It HAS been viewed by millions and those millions all have an opinion on the appropriateness of it all. To say that it was "taken out of context" and it's ok because it wasn't meant to be seen by anyone outside of that room is just silly. When you have video cameras, you have the potential for internet broadcast. But again, it's all beside the point.

So what IS the point?

I guess my point is this. WHY?

The parents said that this was one of the most popular songs of the last year and that is why they were dancing to it. They said that the moves were learned not from the Beyonce music video but from Alvin & the Chipmunks Squeakquel. No! They learned them from a choreographer. An adult who fully understood the sexuality behind the moves. To sit there and tell me that the children don't understand the controversy is pointless because it doesn't matter. The adults in charge DID understand the sexuality and the potential for controversy. I'd be very surprised if they didn't.

You can't possibly tell me that there wasn't another popular song with awesome dance moves that those girls could have learned. And why couldn't they be wearing more clothes? Don't sit and tell me that those costumes allow you to see the body lines and give them freedom of movement. I call bullshit on that! If Beyonce can dance it in a leotard, so can your 8 year old.

What are we teaching our children when we tell them that the best way to win their dance competition is to dress like mini ho bags and waggle their hips for the judges? Why not "Boom Boom Pow" by the Black Eyed Peas? Or "Fire Burning" by Sean Kingston? Or hey....how about "I Got A Feeling" by the Black Eyed Peas...loved by flash mobs everywhere?

I posted the link to this video on Facebook and a guy that went to high school with me had this to say:

I just watched the video as I do have some stong views about parenting. A few years ago people were complaining about Eminem, how it was terrible and wasn't for kids. Well...you're the fucking parent, the so called responsible adult! Do what you can to stop them listening! Back to topic - I nearly swore out loud (I'm at work now) when the Mother condoned it by saying it wasn't meant to be viewed by lots of people. IRRELEVANT. If someone were to attack her daughter, the defence could be - "Well, I never meant for anyone to find out!". You dropped the ball Mr & Mrs Fuckwit.

If I had a daughter that talented, as clearly they are, I guarantee you they wouldn't be doing that.

I had to give him a hand for that. Well said Mr. W, well said.

All my thoughts on the dance routine and its appropriateness aside, I have to give the girls props. They really DID dance it well. It's just a shame that it had to turn out like that. I hope next year their instructor and their parents will think twice.

**********

While we're on the subject though....this is something that weighs heavy on me as I watch my own daughter grow up. I am lucky that so far she has not been much of a girly girl and so not terribly interested in fashion or make up, but it is slowly changing. She has definite opinions on what looks good and what doesn't and I am finding that I have to weigh in far more often on whether what she is wearing is appropriate. The fashion world doesn't make it easy.

Jeans are cut lower, made tighter and shaped differently. Skirts get shorter by the year and shirts are lower cut and more form fitting. And all of it is made for younger and younger girls. There are G Strings for 8 year olds. WHY?! The jeans sit on their non existent hips and shape to their butts while the shirts are cut low in front to show off their non existent boobs....all in the name of sexuality.

Why do we want our 7 and 8 year olds dressed like that? Why do we want our teenagers dressed like that? Why do we conform to the fashion world that insists on dressing women in as sexy a way as possible?

I'm all for dressing sexy ... .when the situation calls for it, when you want to feel good about yourself, when you are old enough. But I see no reason why our children should be clothed in that manner.

In my house, although she's only 8 and it's not a big problem yet, I have a rule of tight jeans must be worn with loose shirt. Tight shirt must be worn with looser pants. I have no problem with short skirts (I'm not talking belt width), but they need to have leggings or tights underneath. Make up? HELL NO. Someone sent Girl Spawn some make up as a gift one time and although I felt like a total Scrooge at the time, I took it away. It's just not necessary. She has earrings, she has hair accessories, she can wear nail polish during the school holidays but make up can wait.

These rules have never been contested until recently. As she gets older, Girl Spawn watches more of the "older" shows and has started to wonder why she can't wear the same things as they do. This is where my problem with Hollywood and the music world comes in. Their influence on our children gets stronger by day and I feel powerless to stop it.

All I can do is set my rules, enforce them and hope for the best.....all while trying to foster good self esteem and body image in both my kids. But that's a post for another time.

So. What are YOUR thoughts on this whole topic? Please grab that cool button and link up. I'd love to hear your thoughts!

For Daffy

2010-05-21T18:31:00.000-07:00

Many of you know, or at least know OF, Daffy from Batcrap Crazy. If you don't, you should. She is one of the most caring, wonderful and awesome people I have ever had the opportunity to get to know in this blog world of ours. She's always got a word of advice or love, a shoulder to cry on, or a funny quip when you need one.

Well, now Daffy needs us.

Daffy's big sister (BigSis) found out last week that she had brain tumours. Since then, a lot has happened. Now, Daffy is having to say goodbye to her sister. And that, my friends, sucks ass in the hugest way.

I am the oldest child in my family. My little sister (LilSis) is 11 years younger than me. When I was a teenager, I spent a fair amount of time wondering why in the heck this little rugrat had to trail around after me and my friends, why I had to babysit AGAIN, and what I had ever done to deserve the torment. But in between, I loved having this small fry worshiping me and wanting to be just like me.

When LilSis was 10, I moved from NZ to Canada in the search of something better. It broke my heart to be leaving her behind but I needed to go. I was gone almost 9 years. By the time I returned to NZ with my family in tow, I'd missed so much. My sister was no longer a little girl, she was now a woman!

We're still getting reacquainted with each other but I love her so much. I can't imagine not having her in my life and so when I heard about Daffy's sister, my heart broke into a million pieces.

Today, in honour of Daffy and her sister, I ask you to please tell your sisters/brothers/moms/dads/friends how much you love them. Tell them how much they mean to you. Repair bridges and just love each other. It's so important.

Daffy - we love you! ((HUGS))

Walking along, singing a song, side by....OUCH!

2010-05-20T18:07:00.000-07:00

Many times over the last couple of weeks I have sat down with my trusty laptop to pound out a post for all of you. Just as many times, I have gotten to the point of putting my fingers on the keys and then stopped. I've been struggling lately with whether or not I wanted to continue blogging here. This is not because anyone has said or done anything, although I do get the occasional email from an anonymous source that makes me question myself..and I hate that. Mostly it has to do with me. I was wondering what, if anything, I was contributing to the world by sitting behind my computer and blathering on about parts of my life.

The answer is simple. Nothing.

I'm not making money doing this, I'm not contributing the economy, I'm not dishing out advice or talking people off ledges. I'm just me.

So I've spent the last couple of weeks thinking very hard about it all. The truth is, I DO want to continue. What I decided is that I really could give a flying monkey's hairy arse if my writing is contributing to anything. This is my blog, my space, my thoughts, my....therapy? Rather than bitching at my husband when he comes home after a long day, I can put it out into the blog world for all to bounce opinions back at me. When I feel like the spawnlets are turning into life sucking leeches, I can visit all your blogs and see that it's not just me.

This isn't one of those posts where I want to hear "Oh Mad Woman...don't leave us, what would we do without you". Because duh...that's a given. I know you all worship the ground I walk on and would perish without me. I mean, I'm surprised many of you are still in existence after the last couple of weeks without me.

This is just me, letting you know where my head has been at the last couple weeks.

So. On with the show.

I went for a walk.

Exciting right? How about some more excitement. I went for a walk with my sister. Say it with me...Ooohhhh, Aaaahhhh. Yeah I know. Terribly thrilling.

Back in December, my Weight Watchers leader brought up the subject of a half marathon that one of the local wineries was sponsoring. Some bright spark in the meeting decided that sounded like a fun idea for people from the meeting to sign up for and managed to con a whole bunch of folks into doing it. That brainiac went home right after the meeting and registered online. That genius may or may not have been me. I'm just sayin'.

So, having registered for the WALK category (cos I'm not stupid y'all, I know that running that far would be a death sentence for me), I had a look at the training schedules they had up on their website. After I'd picked my jaw up off the floor and propped it on the table, I took a few deep breaths and repeated the mantra "I can do this, I can do this, I'm gonna need a shit load of wine when I'm done, I can do this".

Do you guys know how far a half marathon is? 21 kilometres. Just over 13 miles. Or, in my terms....hella fucking far.

Time to rephrase the mantra: "I can do this, I can do this, Screw the wine..there better be a big ass bottle of vodka at the end, I can do this".

The training schedule was great. Go for a walk at varying speeds and distances every few days, slowly building it up until the week of the event. Cool....done!

Yeah right. 5 weeks in, I tossed it and never did it again. Sure, I was still walking but I couldn't be bothered with their schedule. Seemed like a supremely wimpy waste of time to me. Hahahahahahaha!

Fast forward to the beginning of this month where I was crapping my pants in the most spectacular way because I'd begun to realise that walking 21 kilometres was going to be ..um.. hard? By the day of the event I was in peril of running out of clean underwear from my nervousness but I was determined to prevail.

I strapped on my walking shoes, made sure I had my bag with bandaids, pain killers and sun screen, and headed off to collect my mom and sister. Oh, did I not mention that part? Yeah, I'm not completely stupid. I recruited them to walk it with me. On my mother's birthday. (insert maniacal laughter here)

Having arrived at the event, there was hundreds of people milling about. The runners were already off, the hybrid category was just listening to their briefing and I was ready to go hide. Surely I wasn't about to do this! But I stayed, listened to my briefing...and off we went.

We were at the back of the pack when we started and pretty much stayed there. There were people of all ages from 16 to 80 something. There was a woman with a walking stick and a woman as big as me (if not bigger). We set off at a steady pace and I was determined to stay at that pace for as much of the walk as possible.

By the halfway mark of 10.55 kms, my mom's feet were killing her. When we got to the 11 km checkpoint, my sister and I talked and told my mom to drop out. She'd made it over half way, she was in pain, and it was her birthday. I felt bad for her, because I knew she'd feel like a quitter, but there was NO way she could keep going.

LilSis and I carried on. We spent a lot of time walking through areas like, with views just like this:

Most of the walk was through vineyards and along the river. It was beautiful. We were blessed with a fantastically grey and overcast day and a low temperature. It was perfect.

By the 17 km mark I was in pain. A lot of it. I have a bone spur in the heel of my left foot and in addition to that, have had issues with that ankle since I sprained it badly about 8 years ago. But even with all the pain, as I passed the 17 km mark and the guy there said "hey you look like you're about to keel over and I really don't feel like carrying your fat ass outta here, do you want to quit?" (ok, I'm paraphrasing...so sue me), I was all "Hell no! Why the hell would I quit 4 kms from the finish?! Asshat." And I kept going.

I made it. I made it through all 21kms (the last 3 seemed to take forever), and I made it alive. Barely. And, I did it with my little sister by my side for the whole thing. That, I think, was more important to me in the end than the fact that I had just walked that far. She's 11 years my junior and we're finally getting to the point where we can do a lot of stuff together. I love it.

That's me and my sister crossing the finish line. I burst into tears about 2 minutes later, just from sheer relief. Check out the guy in the orange vest behind us, checking out my sister's ass. Cheeky bugger.

So this walk scared me but in the end I came away proud.

Here's my question for you:

What have YOU done lately that has scared you?

Lest We Forget

2010-04-24T18:49:00.000-07:00

Today is April 25th. Today is ANZAC Day. Today we pause to remember the fallen.

ANZAC Day is a day where both Australia and New Zealand take time every year to honour the members of the Australian and New Zealand Army Corps (ANZAC) who fought so very bravely at Gallipoli in World War 1. Over the years, it has become a time of reflection and remembrance for those who have lost their lives in wars all over the world.

My last two years of high school were at a military school in England. We had our own parade for Remembrance Day. Every year that I lived in Victoria, I went to the Remembrance Day services with my dad. November 11th was a day that was very important to me. And so now is ANZAC Day in my new country.

They shall not grow old, as we that are left grow old;
Age shall not weary them, nor the years condemn;
At the going down of the sun, and in the morning
We will remember them.

I still pause for thought on November 11th and will continue to attend ANZAC services on April 25th.

Regardless of your views on the various wars in our past, the ones we are currently fighting and the ones that will inevitably be part of our future; Forgetting the myriad of reasons why our men and women are fighting overseas; Leaving aside the politics of it all - it is important that we remember the ones who have never come home and support the ones that are still there...doing their jobs.

I have friends who have been deployed to Iraq from the UK. My cousin did a tour in Afghanistan from Canada. He, thankfully, made it home to us but many did not...including some of his friends.

I ask that you please put aside your thoughts on the moralities and intricacies of the wars being fought and instead remember those who lost their lives and the loves ones they left behind.

**********

I'd also like to take a minute to offer my thoughts to the families of the 3 NZ Air Force members who lost their lives when their Iroquois helicopter went down in the early hours of this morning on its way to an ANZAC service. May they Rest In Peace.

**Update** I have just read that the fourth person from the crash has also died. My thoughts go out to their family members too.

***UPDATE #2*** Turns out someone, somewhere, screwed up. The fourth person did NOT die. He is expected to recover, but has a long road ahead of him. Hope the person who wrote the article that said he'd died has issued an apology!

**********

Girl Spawn had the honour of marching in the ANZAC Parade and being part of the service down at the cenotaph. She is a member of the St. John Ambulance Youth. She was very proud to be out there.

The old me would have bitch slapped you!

2010-03-22T13:31:00.000-07:00

** Have you entered the GIVEAWAY to win YOUR CHOICE of prize, valued up to $75, from CSN Stores? Why not?! Go HERE and enter to win...I want you to win goodies! Entries open til March 31st!**

Although many of the communities that I lived in growing up were small-ish ones, the impact of that was never fully understood. In my teen years (the ones I was most likely to screw up in), we lived in Air Force communities...the last one in Germany. British Air Force bases. The one in Germany was rather self contained and although we did venture out to explore Germany and Holland, we tended to hang out on base. We did stuff, we screwed around, we came home and discovered that somehow our parents already knew what was happening. It was like they had spies everywhere on base, watching our every move and reporting back to our parents.They probably did. The thing is, the whole "small town" thing was never fully impressed on me because I was a teen who didn't give a crap about anyone but myself and didn't really care how my actions affected my parents.

Flash forward to now, and I'm suddenly having to learn all this small town etiquette. I'm not sure I like it. I'm naturally very outspoken (shocked aren't you?) and it's difficult for me to hold my tongue in many situations. I fear that I may soon have to get a gag or something! You need examples?

Exhibit A) Being a small town in NZ, surrounded by vineyards and farms, there is a lot of good ol' countrified stuff to do. Seriously, we're just one step away from breaking out into a hoe down in the middle of the street some days. So this past weekend I decided on behalf of my lazy, tv loving, family that we should go out and actually do something. One of the schools out in the country was holding a Country Harvest Fair. Sounds awesome right? The spawnlets had pictures of ferris wheels and carousels dancing in their heads, Hotty Hubby had thoughts of drinking beer while perched on a hay bale and I was looking forward to cows.

When we got there, it was little more than a school fundraising gala, but we figured we'd stick around. I let the spawn hop on a trailer ride, I stared at some really ugly turkeys and the rear end of a sheep, and HH stared into space. Then I spotted it!

A table FULL of books was not 20 feet from me. I headed over there to check it out and the first thing that caught my eye was a box full of encyclopedia type books for kids, all about their health and internal systems etc. The two right at the front were all about reproduction and babies and how we develop, so I grabbed them. Then, because I was only blessed with two hands, I put them down on the table right in front of me so that I could continue to look through the box and see if there were any others I wanted.

Colour me shocked when this woman walked up, looked at me, looked at the books, TOOK the books and carried on browsing through the table in front of her.

Me: Um, I was actually going to get those.

Her: Well my grandchildren will love these.

Me: Yes, but I'd already chosen them, and just put them down for a minute.

Her: Well my grandchildren will just think they're great, they're all into this stuff now

My internal dialogue was going crazy the whole time, wondering how I could get the books away from her without seriously injuring her.

She wouldn't give them back. I had to walk away, biting my tongue til it hurt. All because this is a small town and chances are that she knows someone who knows someone who knows me.

Exhibit B) Girl Spawn, at the ripe old age of 7 and a HALF (!!) is still rather partial to dressing up once in a while. Fine with me. For "Book Character Day" at school last year, she dressed as Pinkalicious and we still have all the bits of the costume. She spent a good portion of Sunday afternoon dressed up like this.

In the late afternoon, I needed to run to our NZ version of Wal-Mart. She wanted to come. She was still dressed as a fairy, but what do I care? She's 7. And a half. If she wants to go out in public dressed like that, who am I to say no? So off we went.

We wandered through the store, picking up the few things we needed and then got to the kids department. I grabbed a pair of jeans in a flash of genius and sent her to try them on (so that I know what size to get when I go to the thrift store!). While she was in the changing room, I was approached by a woman who I can only surmise is what retired hookers, who moonlighted as clowns, look like. G-String hanging out the back of her ugly, ill fitting jeans. Boobs pushed up and out, and not even in a remotely attractive way. Make up to rival Bozo the clown and hair teased from here to kingdom come. She looked like an 80s reject. She sidled up to me and said:

You know, I think that in future it would be more appropriate for her to be wearing "real" clothes out in public.

As the voices inside me went absolutely nutso again and my hands started to flap at my sides just aching to bitch slap her, I heard a totally foreign voice come out of my mouth and say:

I'll take that under advisement.

And then my feet took me in the opposite direction of her when all the old me wanted to do was let loose a tirade about how in future it would be in the best interests of the public if she could please just stay indoors as I was pretty sure she was scaring every child within a 50 block radius and even the clowns were running home to rethink their wardrobes lest they be confused with her.

But I kept my tongue because in a small town like this, she probably knows someone I know. Like my mother.

Then there's just the little things like people cutting in front of me at the grocery store and not being able to cause a fuss. (Normally I'd wait for my spawn to speak up and just answer them in a snide manner, loud enough for the perpetrator to hear, but they were silent on the most recent occasion). Or idiot drivers and not being able to flip them the bird.

One of my friends commented on Facebook yesterday that I moved to NZ and became "Nice Maggie", that the old me would have bitch slapped the second woman and what happened to "old Meg".

Believe me, the "old Meg" is still there, itching to come out and play. Unfortunately I'm unable to do it in public most of the time. Small town ~~bullshit~~ etiquette and all that. I guess that's why I blog. So I can vent here. Although, had the whoreclown made that comment in front of Girl Spawn and hurt her feelings, you can bet I would have thrown all good behaviour aside. No one messes with my kid.

Do you live in a small town? Do you have to censor yourself? How do you deal with situations like that?

** I'm over at Looking For My Feet today as well **

Perkiness wins every time!

2010-03-18T05:00:00.000-07:00

From Wikipedia:

Customer service is the provision of service to customer before, during and after a purchase.
According to Jamier L. Scott. (2002), “Customer service is a series of activities designed to enhance the level of customer satisfaction – that is, the feeling that a product or service has met the customer expectation.

I have been working in customer service, in some capacity, since I was 15 years old. I've been a cashier, a sales assistant, a hotel clerk/night auditor and even the work I've been doing in the health care industry is a form of customer service. I learned very early on that there are some very important aspects to providing top notch customer service:

The customer is always right, even when they're full of shit and totally wrong. You must pretend that you worship the ground they walk on and will move mountains bigger than Everest to make them happy. You won't, but they need to believe you will.

It doesn't matter how crappy a day you've had, you must plaster a smile on your face and pretend the world is full of fluffy bunnies with rainbow coloured candies falling out of their asses. Your husband's been boinking the milkman? Your son is failing high school and your daughter's been hooking for extra drug money? No one gives a flying rat's ass....you be cheerful when you're at work. Turns out this also counts in a call centre which is where I discovered that a smile CAN be heard through the phone. Thankfully me flipping you the bird, cannot.

Don't know the answer to a question? You have two options. If you're really good (and the customer in question is somewhat dim), you can waffle your way through and no one will be the wiser. Usually the better option to pick is the one where you swallow your pride and go find someone who DOES know the answer before the customer decides to smash your head into the counter.

As a customer service agent, the face and voice of the company you work for, those three things are really all you have to remember to get by. Sure, knowing how to count and speak to people without throwing up helps, but those are the main things. A trained freakin' monkey should be able to manage it.

So, pause for a moment and imagine this scenario..

I was in a part of town today that for some reason does not have any ATMs from my bank. In fact, there is only one ATM at all in this area. I needed the cash so I sucked up the fee and stuck my card in. Punched a few buttons and followed the instructions. Out popped my card and my $40. Take the card, reach for the money and......

*schloooooop*

....gone!

MOTHER CHUCKER!!! What. The. Hell. Man?!

Stupid machine just sucked back my $40.

Ok. Breathe.

Ohhhh look! An 0800 number! Cellphone out, dial number, go through a million and ten menu options to finally get through to customer service...

Customer Service Rep (male): Thank you for calling Greedy Bank, my name is Dillwad, how can I help you today?

Me: Hi, I just used my Awesome Bank card in your Greedy Bank machine and it pushed my money out as requested and then sucked it back before I could take it.

CSR: Oh I'm sorry, my system is down right now and I can't actually help you. Please hold while I transfer you to someone who can.

*disconnect*

Dial number, go through the million and ten menu options again....

CSR: Thank you for calling Greedy Bank, my name is Dillwad, how can I help you today?

Me: Hi. You just disconnected me. Could we please try this again?

CSR: Yes ma'am, one moment while I transfer you to someone who can help you.

Annoying Menu From Hell: Press 1 for Balance, Press 2 for Sanity Sucking, Press 3 for Lobotomy.

I hang up, dial the number AGAIN and just sit patiently through the menu options AGAIN until it connects me to yet another rep.

CSR #2 (female): Gooooood morning, thank you for calling Greedy Bank, my name is *mumble mumble*, how may I be of assistance today?

Me: Ah. Yes. I used my Awesome Bank card in your Greedy Bank machine to try and withdraw $40. It spat the money out and then sucked it back in.

CSR2: Oh. Well. There's probably not enough money in the machine to complete the transaction.

Me: But it gave me the money. It pushed out the $40 I asked for and before I could take it, not even 10 seconds later, it sucked it back in.

CSR2: Yes. There's probably not enough money in your account to cover the money you asked for.

Me: *sigh* But it gave me the money. And I'm holding a receipt in my hand that shows my balance and there's definitely enough money there.

CSR2: Yes, like I said, there must not be enough money in the machine to allow the transaction to complete.

(I wish strongly for the technology that would allow me to bitch slap a person while talking to them on the phone from miles away)

Me: Ok. But. I'm sitting here talking to you and I've just watched four people walk up to the machine and withdraw money. Significant amounts of money.

CSR2: Ugh. You're. Not. Listening!! I'm saying that there must not be enough money in your account to cover the money you asked for.

(Can someone help with that bitch slap technology?)

Me: Again. I'm holding a receipt that says I have enough money.

CSR2: *raising her voice* You're. Not. LISTENING!! The machine must not have enough money to cover the transaction.

Me: *raising MY voice* First....don't speak to me that way and second, I've just watched ANOTHER four people withdraw money from the machine. And it GAVE me the $40 I asked for. And then it sucked it back.

CSR2: *shouting now* LISTEN!! There's obviously not enough money in your....

I hung up. (And no, it didn't occur to me until after the fact to ask for her supervisor. I'm slow like that.)

There's just so many ridiculous, circular arguments I can take before I get dizzy and fall over, and not in an "oooh I've had to much gin and feel all fuzzy and awesome" kind of way. Is it just me or was the stupid douchecanoe just going around and around in circles? I was about ready to drive blunt needles through my eyes by the time I hung up on her.

So then I whipped out my card from Awesome Bank and dialed their number. Sadly, as is the case with most institutions nowadays, I had to sit through another Annoying Menu From Hell. But within a minute I was through to yet another rep in a call centre.

Awesome Bank CSR: GOOD morning! Welcome to Awesome Bank, my name is Perky Bubbles, how may I help you today?

Me: Oh I hope you can. Greedy Bank ATM took my money back and the supremely unhelpful wench in their call centre likes to argue in circles without producing any great results. Not even a crop circle. What can I do?

A-B CSR: Oh that's easy! I'll just fill out one of these super easy dispute forms, send it off to the Greedy Bank Powers That Be, and in about two or three days you should have that cash credited back to your account.

Me: Um. Wow. Thanks?

A-B CSR: Happy to be of assistance ma'am.

And that, folks, is how it's done. Perky to the rescue.

**********

In other news, on Saturday I will be launching a GIVEAWAY!! You can have the chance to win a prize valued up to $75 from CSN Stores. So stay tuned and make sure to check back and enter lots!

**********

I'm also over at Looking For My Feet...so swing on by and say hi.

A more ambitious woman would have roasted him on a spit!

2010-03-12T14:03:00.000-08:00

I have a little bit of biz to get out of the way before I proceed to the roasting of the "him" in the title.

1) Remember that Great Interview Experiment that I took part in? No? Well reacquaint yourself. I'll wait.

Alright. The person who had the misfortune to interview me was Sus at Joy Is Everywhere. And today she has that interview posted. So head on over, say hi, marvel at my wit and weirdness and leave her some love.

Go on...CLICK HERE.

2) Loco YaYa over at Loco Yaya's Snafud World awarded me this fantastical little award a couple weeks back and I'm just getting around to sharing it with all of you. It's called The Stiletto Award ...for excellence in blogging. Once I'd finished giggling about the fact that someone thought I deserved an award like this, I was ever so grateful.

I'm meant to nominate 5 - 10 people who I think are deserving but let's face it, I don't read anyone's blog who isn't excellent. So you ALL deserve it.

Ok. Now.

Him.

He who has just barely managed to keep his testicles in the right place after opening his mouth and shoving a foot in. He who has mastered the art of backpedalling at high speed. He who barely managed to not have a knife driven through his eyeball.

With all the swimming that I have been doing lately in the interests of weight loss and fitness, I have noticed my body changing in various places. So as we stood in the kitchen last night talking about the places that muscles are going to start showing up, I was very excited about the prospect of having a swimmer's body. I even went so far as to flex what little muscles are currently showing in my arms and had him feel them. Big smile on my face, excitement oozing from every pore.

Which is why he was very lucky that I did not have anything sharp in my hand when he uttered the words "Yeah. You're getting hot".

Excuse me? I beg your pardon...or rather, you should be begging MY pardon! What did you just say? I'm getting hot? GETTING?! I have an idea, why don't you just dig yourself a hole and jump into it. Then cover yourself with 6 feet of dirt and stay there.

Men.

Now, I fully understand that he was trying to be nice and loving and gushy. I get that he merely left the suffix -ER off. This didn't make any more appreciative though.

Apparently I wasn't too tired yesterday though, because I just laughed and laughed and gave him a hard time. And then announced it on Facebook. And then vowed to blog about it. And tell everyone I know. Because you know I couldn't just let it go. Could you?

What have your spouses done that's similar? Did you cut their heart out with a spoon? (there's an extra leg hump in it for you if you know that reference too)

The libido. The life force. The essence. The right stuff. What the French call a certain... I don't know what.

2010-03-08T14:58:00.000-08:00

Erm. Hi. Remember moi? That chick who used to come here on a relatively regular basis and blather on and on about pretty much nothing and you all sat and took it? Did you realise it has been almost a frick frackin' MONTH since I last posted anything here?!?! I know! How the hell did that happen?

I'll tell you how because I know it's been weighing on you and you couldn't possibly continue with the rest of your day...nay - life!... without knowing. It's very simple really. I lost it. I lost my bloggy mojo.

But! (Muahhaha!) I'm back! To terrorize you into oblivion! Or just bore you to death. Also? I'll be back to reading all your stuff very very soon. I'm thinking of campaigning for 36 hour days so that I have enough time to get everything done. What do you think?

So. Here's the general gist of things:

I went away to camp with the spawnlets for the weekend. To the surprise of some people, this was a church run camp. Hubby stayed here. It was a fun weekend with lots of play time, swimming, water slides etc. The kids had a fantastic time and I learned a lot about myself, my beliefs and my future.

When we came home, we spent a couple of hours with Hubby and then put the kids to bed. It was Valentine's Day. I'd already had a text from my mother asking if I had done anything for Hubby for the day and I'm all "Umm. No. We don't DO those over commercialized, store run holidays. We don't love each other enough for all that crap". I went across the road for a bit in the evening and when I came back I found a note on the door signifying Hotty Hubby's total mutiny from the regime. He'd broken 8 years of tradition of NOT doing anything for V-Day and had put together a treasure hunt of sorts. I followed little pink notes around the house, collecting matches and candles and my robe....only to end up in the bedroom where there was soft music playing and a massage waiting. I still didn't get him anything.

A few days later, my younger sister arrived from Auckland for a week and that took up a bunch of time...in a good way. The kids were so happy to see her. Me? I got my ass kicked in a play fight and I'm STILL sporting bruises on my arms. That girl is a tough (and dirty) fighter!

Since then? I've been working, hanging with the kids, READING (!!) and just relaxing. I've even been able to watch the news. And the Olympics. Which reminds me...in your face USA!! Muahahaha. I sat glued to that last hockey game and just about crapped my pants when I thought y'all were gonna win.

And for those of you who are doing Lose It Bitches, since my last blog post, I have weighed in 4 more times gaining 500 g (1.1 lbs) and then losing 1.8 kgs (3.96 lbs), 700 g (1.54 lbs) and last week was 900 g (1.98 lbs). So doing well for the most part. That small gain was the only one I've had in over 3 months so I'm considering myself lucky.

Alright lovers...that's a wrap. I'm going to go and check out what's happening with all of you and hope to have something of more substance next time I come back. Which should be in a few days.

Oh! You can also find me over at Looking For My Feet.....blathering on a bit more about my weight loss journey and successes.

Ain't no valley low enough .... to keep me from coming back to stalk you all

2010-02-11T00:04:00.000-08:00

So I'm going away this weekend with the kids. I'll tell you all about it when I come back, but I'll be away at a camp with the kids. We'll be in a valley out in the middle of butt fuck nowhere. Hotty Hubby will be here. On his own. He'll probably sleep most of the weekend and spend the rest of the weekend drinking beer and eating junk food while watching movies.

Honestly? As much as I would LOVE a weekend of rest and relaxation sans spawnlets, I'm happy that he's getting one instead. He works so hard to support us. He's exhausted at the end of every day. He NEEDS this weekend.

I, on the other hand, will be driving two and a half hours to stay in a cabin with the kids and another a family for the weekend. Kill me now.

See y'all on the flip side!

Calling it a shovel

2010-02-05T14:44:00.000-08:00

If you are someone who has the distinct misfortune to know me in person, you will likely know that I tend to be fairly blunt. I tell it how I see it. If I have something to say to you, I'll say it. If I haven't said it to you but someone else has told you I said it, then that means I was venting to them and then decided it wasn't important enough to discuss with you ... not that I was gossiping. I'll own my words. Always have, always will. I'm a straight shooter and sometimes that bites me in the ass but, in the eloquent and sexified words of the amazing Kurt Cobain, "I'd rather be loved for who I am than hated for who I'm not".

Want to go shopping? Take me with you.

Yes that shirt looks amazing. No that skirt would only look good on a 6 year old. No honey, those pants don't make your ass look fat...your humongous ASS makes your ass look fat.

If you're having doubts about your boyfriend, chances are you do NOT want to talk me about him because if you're having doubts then I've already got his method of demise picked out along with a snarky epitaph for his headstone in the woods.

When I started this blog, I did it with the idea of having somewhere to pour out my random thoughts that mostly occurred to me in the middle of the night while I was working at the No Tell Motel. That was almost two years ago. Obviously I am no longer in the same job let alone the same country. My thoughts, opinions and ideas have evolved. My readership has increased (thank you all...you make the attention whore in me VERY happy) and my blogroll has increased. But through it all, one thing has stuck with me.

OWN YOUR WORDS

If I write something on here, I am fully prepared to stand behind it. I've been informed a few times by email that people will not be returning to read my stuff because they "don't care for the language used" or find me "too coarse and crude". That's totally fine, I'm not to everyone's taste and I really don't care.

So take a moment, if you will, to imagine my surprise when I received a comment this morning telling me to come on over to this other blog because there was "an *ahem* unusual award" waiting for me. Of course I immediately went skipping off over there because, well, wouldn't you?! And this is what I found waiting for me:

Holy Shit Bubbles! Ain't it purty?!

The schmexy Madmother over at Meaninless Meandering from a Madmother decided I was blunt enough to "call a spade a fucking shovel" and bestowed this upon me. For which I scream a Squeee filled THANK YOU!!

Here's the "rules" of the award, copied & pasted directly from her because I cannot possibly paraphrase in a way that would even bring justice to it:

This award is for the straight-shooters. The "tell it to someone who gives a fuck" bloggers who don't let the ignorant minority dictate to them. As a certain commenter from my last post put it (and something a dear friend called me a few years back) the ones who call a spade a fucking shovel!

The receivers of the award (and I hesitiate to use the word winners as it is not some type of lame-arsed competition, it is merely a show of appreciation for the blogger who doesn't pretty up the harsh realities) do NOT have to pass it on! If you wish to, great! Means I get to find some new no-bullshit blogs. If not, meh, not my problem.

This is not to be passed on to anyone who cannot handle the heat. You know, the bloggers who post one controversial topic, get blasted, and so delete it whilst whining "youse are all bitches" under their breath. If you write it, own it! Note: exception to this rule is if you post something in anger which hurts those you love. Not anonymous, faceless bloggers or followers, but someone you genuinely care for, and realise later when you have calmed that it was not acceptable to blog about. We have all done this at one time or another.

This award is not to be awarded for just being nasty! It is for those blunt, honest, sometimes brutal bloggers who post from passion, not spite.

Link me (Madmother)! After all I am an attention seeking bitch according to some...

And so, because I CHOOSE to pass it on, I'd like to bestow this beauty upon a few people who I think are blunt like a sledge hammer.

Adreinzgirl @ Think Tank Momma
Dual Mom @ We're At Dad's That Week
Aunt Juicebox @ Bacon Is My Lover
Daffy @ Batcrap Crazy
Cape Cod Gal @ Diamond In The Rough
Kelley @ MagnetoBold Too!
Twenty Four @ Twenty Four At Heart

There are lots of others, but a lot of the people I read are also on other blog rolls so I left some for other folks. But like the rules say, you don't have to share if you don't want to.

Before I leave....what are YOUR personal rules for your blog? Do you stand behind the words you put down? Do you tell it like it is? Do you feel like never coming back here again?

Just a quick one for today

2010-02-02T23:48:00.000-08:00

Lose It Bitch! update:

I only lost 100 grams this week. For you folks who don't speak kilos and grams, that's about 0.22 lbs.

*sigh*

That takes my current weight down to 318.78.

I know that a loss is a loss, and honestly I was expecting a gain after my "I don't give a shit" week of eating too much, but still.

More on this over at "Looking For My Feet".

*~*~*

In other, and more glee provoking, news..... I was given another award. Didn't I just make that sound like I've got oodles of awards pouring in? Yeah, not so much.

Anyway, Toddler Knows Best gave me this lovely little thing that made me go "SQUEEEE!" with delight. The rules say I am meant to link to the blog that gave it to me (done), post it somewhere on my blog or in a post (done) and then nominate 12 other blogs to give it to.

Well. There are so many of you out there who I love and honestly I just don't have the energy to try and decide why one merits the award over another. So I'm giving it to ALL of you. Go ahead. Snag it. Pass it on if you like. I am very grateful to have you all as readers and you fill my days with sunshine. Thank you for sticking around to read my stuff.

It's because I taste so damn good!

2010-02-01T20:14:00.001-08:00

There, that title should bring a few more pervs out of the woodwork. You can never have too many pervs really can you? As long they're not leaving me those long-winded comments in some random Asian language that I can't understand but that link to porn sites, I'm fine with them stopping by. Maybe I'll learn something I didn't already know.

Anytasty....the reason I've called you all here today is to talk about my apparently tasty qualities. It's really the only conclusion I can come to for what has been happening.

Since I was a young girl, I have loved animals. I've mentioned this before....my adoration for the animals of the world and the desire to love and help them all. I've worked in pet stores, owned animals and helped to look after other people's. So given that, WHY do they keep biting me?

When I was much younger (about 10 or 11 I think?), I stopped to say hello to a horse in a field. He gave me all the right "come hither" vibes and even batted his eyelashes at me. I had some sort of food on me (like that comes as a shock?) and offered it to him in the hopes that he would love me more. He sure did! He took my whole bloody hand into his mouth and then promptly bit me. On the middle finger. Maybe he was trying to teach me a lesson of some sort?

Not too many years later we were living in Wales - land of the sheep and dodgy blokes doing creepy things with sheep. As I was walking down the street, I came across two HUGE cats hissing and growling at each other. They were clearly vicious and demented and I was wary as I approached them.

I could see that the larger one was unimpressed with me; I was obviously getting too close to his prey. I had a destination in mind though and being the lazy person that I am, I kept going. The next thing I know, claws are embedded in my leg, I'm yelling and trying to shake it off. But it hung on and carried on hissing at it's enemy. I finally escaped and made my way home. As I walked in the door I started to tell my mother what had happened. Maybe she could call the zoo and get them removed before they mauled some poor unsuspecting old woman! I pulled up my pant leg and was confronted by a beautiful set of puncture wounds and blood running down my leg. It's a surprise that I could even WALK! It's a wonder that these animals aren't required to be tagged and wear signs. I would hate for someone else to get savaged by....

...a kitten. I'm so ashamed.

Fast forward about 7 more years and I'm living in Auckland, New Zealand with my family. I worked in a pet store in a mall. I spent my days helping people pick cat foods and save their fish. I encouraged mothers to buy goldfish and fathers to buy beer to cope with the whining. And I learned how to train ferrets. Fun! I trained them to go from nippy little bastards to sweet snuggly little lovelies.

So, of course, when a guy who looked like he belonged in the backwoods of Hickville, Kentucky with his Uncle Daddy, complete with overalls and mullet, came in looking for guidance in how to re-home his ferrets, I nearly jumped on him to hump his leg from here to kingdom come.

He agreed to let me have them and their cage. I was over the freakin' moon.

Now, keep in mind that I knew a lot about ferrets and their care and their natural instincts. All information that somehow remained in my brain under my goddamn pillow the next morning when I went out to see these lovely creatures who had received virtually NO training or handling. These fuzzballs who had not yet had their breakfast.

I opened the cage and pulled one out for cuddles. As I held him at waist level and cooed at him, he suddenly decided that my face looked rather appetizing and jumped.

SONOFABISCUIT THAT HURT!!!!!

Something you may not know about ferrets is that when they bite, their jaw locks. Sound fantastic, no?

As you can imagine, I started screaming my ever lovin' head off. My mom and step-dad came running. My sister, who was about 8 at the time, stood in the doorway yelling. The ferret hung off my face like a big fuzzy icicle.

My mother tried to pry its jaws apart. I kept screaming. My step-dad tried to wring its scrawny little neck until it passed out enough to pull it off. I screamed "DON'T KILL IT!". Finally, they managed to get it off my face and I was taken to lay on the table of a very gorgeous doctor while he flushed out a nice set of puncture wounds on my face so that I didn't get lock jaw myself.

It took me awhile to stop seeing ferrets like this...

Which bring us to present day and my mother's cat. It's a lovely wee Burmese and as we've owned this breed before and had them be very very sweet, it was quite a shock to meet him. He's a complete freakin' psycho. I am currently sporting a bruise on my left boob where he bit me. He's definitely the nastiest pussy I've ever met.

Now I've been told that all these creatures are crazy, but I prefer to tell myself that it's because I'm delumptious (thanks to Boy Spawn for that word!). My question for all of you now is this.

HOW DO I STOP THEM EATING ME?!?!

Weiners - Part 2...with some beans!

2010-01-29T00:05:00.000-08:00

And now for the rest of the questions that y'all asked me. I'm sure you're just dying to hear the answers eh?

Aunt Juicebox from Bacon Is My Lover and Dual Mom from We're At Dad's That Week wanted to know "What do you miss most about Canada, and what about your new home makes it feel like the right decision?"

Aha! What's funny is that I was just talking about this yesterday. Well, the first part of the question anyway. Obviously I miss my friends and family a LOT, but you know what I just realised in a big way? I desperately miss Costco. I really do. I can't just walk into a cavernous building and pick up 20 gallons of mayonnaise for $7.00 anymore. I can't go shopping on a Saturday morning having not yet fed my children breakfast and have them eat for free, solely from the samples being doled out by the sullen and slightly unhygienic "sample studs" placed strategically around the store. And that makes me sad.

As for what makes me feel like we made the right decision in moving here - Um, did I mention I had Christmas in the summer? Or that my spawn have more freedom to grow as children and explore the areas around us? Or that the lifestyle is healthier in general and it's rubbing off on me? Yeah. All that.

Alex from Whoa-Mumma (I don't have a link yet, her blog has disappeared) wanted to know "If you had 3 wishes, what would you wish for (and no never ending wishes cos that's cheating)?"

Hm. That's a tough one. And I totally thought of never ending wishes, but seeing as you're being mean and not letting me use it, I'll have to actually use my rapidly melting brain and think.

Ok. I'd wish for a rockin' body, an income of a million dollars a year, and health for my family and me for life.

Running Professor, loving and doting husband of our beloved Moonspun from Moonspun Spins wanted to know "If you were alone in a dark and haunted forest, what is one thing you'd take with you? And you already have a chocolate bar in your pocket."

I was going to be all cheeky and say something snarky like "umm....duh....a flashlight?!" but then I thought that given that he's a prof, he might be looking for something a little more in depth and possibly in the form of a thesis. And then I thought, but I slept through most of my last two years of high school and just kind of cruised through (with top marks) my college diploma course so he ain't gonna get that. There's also the whole problem of it being late on a Friday night and I just spent the day melting in the heat. So, I'm going to go with this....

Umm. Duh. A flashlight?!

And then there's the aforementioned Moonspun from...um...Moonspun Spins (you got a double mention! lucky girl) who wanted to know "What surprises you most about being a mom?".

This was a hard one for me to answer. Pretty much everything about being a mom surprises me, not least of which is the fact that ...well... I'm a mom! The way they climb into bed and snuggle up with me, the cute little kisses they dole out and the way they tell me they love me....all fill my heart with so much love that I never even dreamed was possible. The way my heart breaks when someone has hurt them in some way and the way I wish I could get vengeance for those hurts but have to restrain myself. I'm constantly surprised at the reserves of patience that I have to delve into some days and even more surprised at the things that come out of my mouth that I swore that I would never say when I became a mom. But most of all, I think I'm surprised that the universe has entrusted me with the well being of these two gorgeous little souls, to bring them up and mould them into good, productive people. I'm surprised by the honour that that task brings with it.

Monique a.k.a Surferwife from A Day In The Life Of A Surferwife wanted to know "If you had to choose, would you rather use the same towel after your shower without ever washing it again OR sleep on the same sheets forever without washing?"

So, once I finished throwing up a little in my mouth (which, by the way, is never fun but especially when you had baked potatoes for dinner) and quit gagging, I was able to think about this a little bit. And I still didn't like it. Monique, you're an evil person...and yet ridonculously funny. It's a good thing I love ya! I think I'll have to go with never washing my towel. I LOVE fresh sheets and don't think I could do that. I've been known to let it go a tad longer than it should but never washing the sheet is beyond me. The towel on the other hand? I think I'd have to employ the ol' "oops, it fell in the shower and got wet and soapy and scrubbed somehow" ploy.

BlueViolet from A Nut in a Nutshell wanted to know "What is the biggest mistake you've made in life?"

Hoooooo. I try very very hard not to look back at my life and think of anything as a "mistake" because that then makes me feel like I should regret it, and I've reached a point in my life where I acknowledge that everything that has happened in my life has led to other things, so I really can't regret any of it. Had you asked me this question a few years ago, I would have said that leaving New Zealand in 2001 to go back to Canada was one of the biggest mistakes because I left my sister behind when she was just 10, so I missed out on all the years between 10 and 19. BUT!! Had I not gone back, I would never have met Hotty Hubby and had my two beautiful children. I can't imagine life without them.

One of my new life mottoes (that just looks wrong, but the dictionary assures me it's spelled right!) is "never look back with regret". I'm trying to live by that.

Mumma Boo of Mumma Boo x 2 wanted to know "If you woke up one morning with the ability to fly, would you tell anyone or keep it a secret?".

Much as it would seem to be one of those things you'd keep a secret, I think the first time I launched myself off a building and didn't turn into cat food on the pavement, my secret would be out. Unless I can combine this superpower with my ability to become invisible..in which case the secret will be kept.

Meg (who totally stole my name, I swear!) from Just Another Manic Mommy wanted to know "If you could go to Disney World with any celebrity alive today, who would it be?"

Ohhhh I was totally going to go with my age old answer of Shemar Moore but then I thought it would be much more fun to go with someone like Jimmy Fallon because he's hilarious, or Johnny Depp because I could take him on the Pirates of the Caribbean ride and it would be awesome. Although I hear Miley Cyrus can shut down Disney just because she wants to be there, so maybe I'll take her. I could ditch her part way through right?

And last but not least.....

Brandice from Bucket of Walnuts wanted to know "Do you think there is anything to the "condition/issue" of "Middle Child Syndrome", or is that just a made up term several people I know use?".

Do you want the PC answer or my answer? Oh right! This is the game where we ask ME anything, so you get my answer.

I think it's bullshit that people who ARE middle children made up because Mommy & Daddy didn't love them enough to bow to their every whim.

Ok, so that answer was a bit tongue in cheek because I don't want to offend too many of you, but you get the point. I'm the oldest, by 11 years, in my family so I wouldn't have any idea what being a middle child is like. My answer aside though, I think you should totally milk that middle child crap for all it's worth!

That's a wrap lovers! Maybe we'll play this game again sometime!

Weiners - Part 1

2010-01-25T23:09:00.000-08:00

It's been one of those weeks people. One of those weeks. You all know the kind of week I'm talking about. The ones where you wish you'd never bothered getting out of that one morning that started it all off. Yeah. That kind.

Nothing horrible has happened, I just feel like there hasn't been much time to come up for air. I've done hardly any reading of all your blogs, I haven't posted here, and I've not finished my book. *sigh* I just checked my Google Reader and just about died. There are 257 posts sitting there waiting to be read. On the one hand, I want to just sit here all afternoon and ignore the bleating of the spawn as they beg for food as if I haven't fed them in days as opposed to minutes, but I can't do that. So I need to either be ruthless and hit that dreaded "Mark all as read" button, which I hate to do, or I need to be selective and only read some of them. I'm leaning towards the evil button because I don't want to have to choose.

Anylame....Boy Spawn is currently defying all seasonal cues and ignoring the hearts and frills that have sprung up all over town in favour of Valentines Puke and is vegging out and watching The Polar Express. Whatever keeps him busy while Girl Spawn is out I guess. It does give me time to finally announce the "winners" of the question game we played. I say "winners" with the air quotes and sarcasm because really, you ain't winning much....just some little Kiwi stuff and my lurve. Aren't you glad?

**I ended up with 17 questions, so I'm going to split this into two parts.**

So. As picked by the Hotty Hubby. I gave him a list of all the questions with no names attached and told him to pick his top 3. And he did. If you three can send me your mailing address, I'll get your stuff out to you! Here you go:

Weiner #1 - Shazzy from Broome Blunders & Brilliance. She asked "What would be the first thing you would do if you were invisible?".

Great question Shazzy! I'm sure the answer is probably one that occurred to many of you. I'd strip naked and run around shaking my tits at everyone. Because they wouldn't be able to see all the bumps and lumps, or even the tits, this would be exceptionally fun. And then I'd pants them all

Weiner #2 - Sus from Joy Is Everywhere. She asked "What is one thing you have always wanted to do in life, but have been too scared to try?".

Hoooo boy! This required some major thinking! I always wanted to gather the guts and motivation to actually finish, and put together, all the stories I've written over the years....put them into a book and submit it to a publisher. But I'm terrified of rejection. So I keep it here, along with the kids book I started, and it does nothing. Maybe when I'm old and grey.

Weiner #3 - Dto3 from Football, Ballet and Beer. He asked "Other than me, of course, who you most likely be willing to leave your husband for, knowing that as soon as you did, all you'd have is each other because you'd now be dead broke?".

Buahahaha!! I laughed so hard at this one, mostly because I've said for years that if a hot black guy with an Irish accent showed up at my door and asked me to leave with him, I'd be gone. I'm not entirely sure how much I was kidding. I guess we'll find out when it happens eh? But in the meantime, how about I just go with Shemar Moore from Criminal Minds. I don't give a gnats fanny how broke we'd be....I could look at his face forever. Of course, if I can't have Shemar, I'm more than happy to leave for you Dto3!

*drool*

Noelle at Elastic Waistbands and Comfortable Shoes (oh how I love that blog title) asked, "If you could go on a road trip with any person, dead or alive, who would you go with and where would you go?".

Y'know, I was going to pick someone famous but seeing as I've already run off with Shemar Moore, I think he covers my celeb bases. (And he'd totally get all the way to a home run with me!) So I pick my little sister. She's 19, she's awesome, and I don't know her nearly as well as I should, so a road trip would be great! As for where we'd go? I think we'd start with a tour of the USA because we've only been to a couple places, and then we'd go re-discover Europe.

Kys over at Stir-Fry Awesomeness asked, "What is the most embarrassing thing that you've ever done (drunk or sober)?".

Oh honey, I haven't got enough time in the world to fully and properly answer this question. But let me delve into the deep, dark recesses of my memory banks and see what I can find. Ok. I got suspended from school when I was 16. Not embarrassing enough? Ok. It was a boarding school. I started there in only the 2nd year that girls had EVER been at the school. Still not enough? I was suspended because my boyfriend at the time decided it would be an incredibly bright idea to sneak from his boarding house to mine in the middle of the night and climb through my window to visit. We were suspended because that same boyfriend, being an assclam, decided to leave a muddy footprint on my windowsill on one of his visits (that I never declined, for the record) and the next morning my House Mistress, finding my bedroom curtains closed when they should be open, opened my curtains and FOUND said footprint. The embarrassing part? Being taken from chapel on Sunday morning, to the Deputy Head Master's office where I had to 'fess up to my actions. Of course, we were spoken to separately so I had NO idea what boyfriend/assclam was admitting to or not. For my part? I chose to admit nothing other than the fact that he had indeed been in my room and that ALL we did was talk. *snort* Turns out that he did the same. Phew! We got suspended for a week, our parents were not terribly impressed. Mine had to come across to England from Germany to get me, and his dad said "Well, if you were going to get caught, I hope you had fun". The MOST embarrassing part? Finding out that we had been referred to, by staff members, as "sexual miscreants and deviants". Fun times people, fun times! And I was SOBER!

Lisa from The World According 2 Lisa asked "You are told you have won a trip. All the tickets & paperwork are taken care of, but all you cane take is (a) 10 items in a small travel pack and (b) wear a max of 8 items on the plane (socks = one pair, glasses count). What do you wear & pack?"

Well, you didn't tell me where I was going, so I decided I won a tropical trip to Bali. Which is great because it makes packing SO much easier.

Wear: Flip Flops, Glasses, Sarong, Tank top, 2 pairs of underwear, bra and jacket. I figured if I wore 2 pairs of undies, I could wash one and wear one.

Pack: Soap, Toothbrush, Toothpaste, 2 books, my iPod, another sarong, bathing suit, tank top, and a picture of my new beau - Shemar.

Kerrie over at The Mini Van Soap Box wanted to know "What brand of underwear do you wear?".

Erm. *cough* Um. Are you making a pass at me? I wear the cheapest brand I can find at whatever store is closest, in the biggest quantities I can buy at the time. But if you have a better suggestion, I'm happy to listen.

Mad Woman A.K.A Slacker Bitch

2010-01-20T17:11:00.000-08:00

**I haven't forgotten to announce the winners of the "Ask Madwoman Anything" game, I am just waiting on the decision from my impartial judge. Update coming soon**

If you've been keeping up with all the peeps taking part in the Lose It Bitch challenge, you may have noticed a distinct lack of update on that front over here. Or not. Whatevs. Here's the thing, most people doing the challenge are following the rules and doing their weigh ins and updates on Sunday or Monday. But I weigh in at Weight Watchers on a Wednesday evening. So by the time Sunday rolls around, I can barely remember what my kids' names are, let alone the fact that I should be doing my update.

So. Being the super awesome rebel that you all know and adore, I'm breaking the rules. I will no longer do my updates on Sunday or Monday. I will do mine on Thursdays. Which is Wednesday where you are. Most of you. Never mind that, just remember that I'll be doing my updates on a different day. I know. Who cares right?

What this DOES mean, is that I technically started this 3 days before the rest of you. But it also means that I will be ending this 3 days before you as well. So it all evens out. So I've stood on the scale 4 times now....compared to your 3. Make sense?

Anybitch, here's my update for last week AND this week...all in one magnificent Lose It Bitch edition.

So last week, I ate ridiculous things and barely exercised. The night before my WW weigh in I went for a fast paced 8km walk which quite literally saved my ass. Unfortunately, as a result of my poor choices through the week, I only lost 300 grams. That's 0.66 lbs. Here's the proof pic.

This week? I made slightly better food choices, I did a couple workouts on the Wii and drank more water. So I lost 1 kg. That's 2.2 lbs.

More pic proof.

I will do better this week. More walking. Better food choices.

*~*~*~*

You can also find me over at Looking For My Feet, where I explore the reasons for some of the choices we make and how it cascades down in our lives.

Google Search Term of the Week? - Vintage hairy MILF - Yeah. I think this comes into the "ummmmm" category, no?

It's like the search for the Holy Grail. Only more humiliating. And less Knights that say "Ni!"

2010-01-18T00:05:00.000-08:00

Having now had this here blog for two years (!!), I realise that I have not yet completed my quest for global ~~domination~~ humiliation. I have shared tales with you that should have made you run for the hills screaming "Please don't let anyone know I kinda sorta know her", but instead you pulled up a chair, made some popcorn and kicked back with a beer or six. This is all totally fine with me as long as you aren't leaving a mess. We had to give Cape Cod Gal a bib because she kept dripping ketchup off her corn dogs.

I realised today that it had been awhile since we'd done a "Hahahah look at her!" post and then I was over visiting Aunt Becky at Mommy Wants Vodka and she was all smacking us in the face with the gauntlet and issuing challenges like she hadn't a care in the world. She has challenged us interwebber folks to a duel. A duel!! I know. Except we don't get to play with swords or even shoot each other in the back. Nay! This is a duel of a different sort.

See, she got all brave 'n' stuff and posted a bunch of pics from back in the day. THEN she realised that she just put it all out there and we'd all be sitting there thinking that how glad we were it wasn't us. But she's a smart cookie that Aunt Becky. So she issued her duel, her challenge, her well worded double dog dare. And we all know that most of us can't walk away from that. Ok. I can't walk away from that. Whatever.

And so, I present to you.....my AWESOMENESS in picture form. Yeah that's right. I rocked the 80s and 90s.

Circa 1983 - 4 years old. Mouth open. I queried whether I was yelling at the camera and my father said "No....just practising to be a mother."

Circa April 1986 - The back of this picture was labelled "A new haircut, why so solemn?" SERIOUSLY people? I dunno. I'm told it's the "Dorothy Hamell" cut and that everyone had them. Don't I look lovely? And happy?

Really, where could I go from there? But Aunt Becky issued a challenge and a challenge I shall meet!

THIS? This is why people are scared of clowns!

1989. Ruffles and plaid and glasses, OH MY! And check out the spiffy hair peeps. Woo!

Oh. Emm. Gee! (said in a very tween voice). White socks and black shoes? Glasses that dwarf the face. "Singin' In the Rain" pose. Schmexy no?

Let's skip ahead a few years shall we? Circa 1993/1994...this was either my 14th or 15th birthday. I'm not sure why I look so very sullen...but I'm pretty sure that was a normal look for me around then.

Oooh! I found a happy one. First day of starting my new school. - 1995. A boarding school. A military boarding school. I learned how to use a sword there. That's about all I learned.

I actually did a post like this not long after I started this blog....you can check out some other time warp pictures HERE.

Now that we're all done playing with the Wayback Machine through Mad Woman's life, I hope that some other of you will take up Aunt Becky's challenge!!

Because this is more important...

2010-01-14T12:44:00.000-08:00

I had a whole other post planned for today. It was a little bit funny, a little bit witty and whole lot of weird. But then a massive earthquake, measuring 7.0 on the scale, hit Haiti and the country is reeling. I'm sure you've heard about it. If you haven't, you've been living under a rock.

So, I decided to skip my meaningless post and talk about this instead. Don't worry, I won't take up too much of your time because I would far rather you were off doing something to help these people than sitting here reading my crap.

The devastation is incredible. The Presidential Palace has toppled. The death toll is rising. Bodies are having to be piled along the roadsides. Men, women and children are being pulled out from underneath the rubble every minute. Sadly, many of them are no longer living.

The question many of us have been asking is "But what can we do?". Well my friends, I'll tell you. You could find most of this information by doing a Google search, but it's a little overwhelming...so let me save you some time.

** The Huffington Post has a list of ways that you can help, places where you can donate and will continue updating about the events in Haiti. Their most recent update tells us the death toll is around 50,000 people. Click HERE to read the update and see a few of the ways you can help.

** The Pioneer Woman does giveaways all the time. Today she's doing a different kind of giveaway. Leave a comment on THIS POST and at the deadline, she'll do a draw from all the comments and give $500 to the relief effort charity of YOUR choice. Awesome right? But wait! There's more! She is also giving 10 cents PER comment to the relief efforts. It'll be split between the top 3 charities mentioned in the comments. If you consider that on a normal day, The Pioneer Woman averages around 10,000 comments (from what I've seen), that's a fair chunk of change. When I last checked, she was almost at 12,000 comments. So. Get on over there and leave a comment won't you?

** CNN has a list of way you can help, as well as a list of organizations that are providing support to this country in distress. Click HERE to check it out!

** Doctors Without Borders, who have been on the ground since before the earthquake, have a link on their front page to donate directly. Click HERE.

** The Salvation Army, with branches all over the world, has links on all their front pages for you to donate. Please search for your country if I haven't listed it below.

USA
Canada
New Zealand
Australia
UK

There are soooo many ways to help out. Even if you can't help financially, please check out some of these organizations and see if there is another way to help....collecting stuff for packages etc.

And failing all else? Spread the word. Think some positive thoughts or say a few prayers for these people. They need everything we can give them.

A request, a game and a prize!

2010-01-09T18:30:00.000-08:00

The Request (sounds ominous doesn't it?)

We need to talk y'all. It is exceedingly important that we have a chat about this topic because I fear that if we don't, if we continue down this road unchecked, that I may have to come and shave your eyebrows off. Understand?

I have been happily watching my readership stats go up, up, up in the last few weeks. I have no idea why...I assume it's because I've been stalking more people and humping more legs than I usually do...but I'm grateful nonetheless. With increased readers comes additional comments which makes a comment whore like me go "Squeeee!!" with delight.

All those comments come pouring into my inbox and I get a warm, fuzzy feeling inside (probably a lot like the one Richard Gere gets when he plays with hamsters...but less scratchy). But then when I go to reply to your comments and tell you how much I love you and want to be your best friend, I find I can't for most of you. And that makes me sad. Despondent even. It's not a fun time in the Mind of a Mad Woman when that happens. And then I get all pissy and don't bother replying to anyone and that just makes me seem like more of a bitch than I really am. We don't want that. Do we?

SO! I would like to make a request (drenched in vanilla sweetness and oodles of bribery) that y'all do something for me, if you feel so inclined. Which you will. Because you love me. You love me right? RIGHT?!!? Could you all please make sure that you have your Blogger settings right so that when I hit "reply to this most fantastical comment", it doesn't come up with the most annoying thing in the world:

noreply-comment@blogger.com

It's a really easy fix, I swear it is!! All you have to do is follow the lovely instructions that Lee from Headaches, Hormones & Hot Flashes set out in this post HERE

Alright, I know some of you are lazy like me and can't be bothered to click over to see what it says, so (and I hope Lee will forgive me) I will just copy the bit that tells you what to do.

1. Go to your Dashboard on Blogger dot com.
2. Hit your edit profile, right next to your picture, avatar or whatever else you have showing.
3. Scroll down to the line that says : Show my email address and CHECK THE BOX.
4. Hit save.
Now, for those of you who do not want a regular email address to show, go to Gmail, Yahoo or any other number of places and get a FREE, yes FREE, email account and set it up

Please? Pretty please?

The Game (we needed something fun after all that)

I really can't take credit for this idea. It's been done a million times on two million blogs. But it was Moonspun that I most recently remember doing it ... so, because my creative juices are running a tad low this week (leading me to ask for inspiration on Twitter), we're going to play the game too.

From now until Sunday the 17th, you can ask me questions. Anything. Anything at all. And I'll do my best to answer them. You can leave the questions here in the comments or you can email me at

mindofamadwoman at hotmail dot com

And at the END of the week, I'll have an impartial source pick the best three questions. First place will win a big bunch of Kiwi stuff. Second and third place will win a smaller amount. Goodies people, Goodies!!

I can't really think of any boundaries for the questions which means that there probably aren't any. Should make it easy for you all.

GO!

*****

You can also find me over at Looking For My Feet....yakking away about the power of words.

This is what happens when you ask for inspiration

2010-01-07T05:00:00.000-08:00

People think that we have the best life but I think we need to set some things straight. Sure, it's kind of cool hanging out all day just enjoying the breeze and not really doing anything, but it's really not all it's cracked up to be.

Small children love to grab us. I can be just walking through the house, minding my own business, and the next thing I know there's a hand on me and I'm being pulled. It doesn't feel good! And my brothers and sisters have it bad too. Petting zoos, houses, out on the street.....those little rugrats just don't know when to keep their damn hands to themselves.

People pay WAY too much attention to the way we hold ourselves. If I'm up, it's a good thing. If I'm down, it's a bad thing. If I tuck myself between a pair of legs, people get all concerned. What the hell do you want people?? And could you stop getting all excited and acting like an idiot when I go side to side? It's really embarrassing to watch.

My cousins, out in the fields, get crapped on ALL the time. Seriously...the shit is not proverbial out there! It's a real issue. And then there's the flies. They swarm and they sit and they lay eggs and then some asshole thinks it's a great idea to come and pull them all off and they're not gentle! But really the shit is the second worst thing about our lives. Once you have shit on you, it's hard to get off. The smell is rank, the feeling is nasty and hardly anyone helps you. Unless you live in a house. The other folks in the house are a bit touchy about shit all over the place and you'll get thrown in a cold shower faster than you can say "ohforfucksakewhoshatonmethistime!"

The worst thing though? Sheltering assholes. You know how it is, they put themselves out there, all puckered up and ready for action and then expect you to shelter them. It's a really demeaning and annoying thing and I'm about done with it.

I think in my next life I'd like to be a pair of tits cos at least they're up front and people like to play with them....hopefully in a gentle way. This life as a tail, providing shelter to assholes the world over? It's not one I care to repeat.

****************************************

This little story of a tail was brought to you..well by me. Duh. (Fuck off! It's late as I type this!) But last night when I was brain dead and tired, I sent out a Tweet saying:

Yeah I know. Lazy cow. Whatever. Bite me. It worked...the bribery worked!!

Guarav from Random Reflections sent me back a Tweet saying:

After I'd finished pissing myself laughing, I looked at Hotty Hubby and he looked at me (because otherwise? RUDE!) and I thought "why not?!". So thanks Guarav! You gave me a giggle and you gave me a weird topic to write about.

I might have to try this tactic again! Maybe I'll make it into a contest for another giveaway ...that'd be fun eh?

OH! I almost forgot. Have I mentioned the AWESOMENESS that is Kelley at MagnetoBoldToo! lately? No? Well she is. So I suggest you go and check her out.

A decade gone, A new one to come

2010-01-01T16:41:00.000-08:00

As we got closer and closer to the new year, I was starting to panic a bit about what I could write for my first post of the new decade. It's been almost two years since I started this here blog. Two years ago I had one ~~million~~ followers. Today, I have...um....more. And I'm thankful for all of you. Which is why I'm going to spare you the list of resolutions that never changes from year to year. I was going to do the meme that Aunt Becky did, but couldn't figure out how to answer any of the questions. Lame, I know.

Instead, I give you a decade in review. And I might throw in a few goals at the end. Goals, mind you, not resolutions.

~*~*~*~

In the year 2000 (am I the only one who hears Conan right now? You know, like THIS video? I probably am) I was a capricious young woman living in Auckland, NZ and dating a guy that drove a Porsche. A cherry red Porsche. It was beautiful and it drove like a dream. I thought I was the shit every time I sat in that car. And I totally was. Except for one thing. The guy who owned the car? 8 years my senior and still living in his mommy's basement, getting her to cook his meals and do his laundry. The guy pulled in over 100K every year EASY and yet.....well yeah. Looking back, I realise he wasn't that interesting or attractive. But he drove a freakin' PORSCHE!!

As the year progressed, I moved from living in my boss's basement to living with a friend and, as it turned out, her lazy ass boyfriend who liked to abuse my cat and not pay any bills. Fun times people!

I spent Christmas that year getting drunk and playing strip poker with a tall, gorgeous guy named Matt who happened to wander into the pet store I worked in.

By the time 2001 rolled around and had proved to NOT be the Space Odyssey we'd all been promised, we'd all realised how ludicrous we looked the previous year, stocking up on everything in sight in case the world should come to an explosive and technology provoked end.

For my part, I had somehow reached the conclusion that I was decidedly unhappy living in Auckland with my family down in another part of the country. Instead of moving down to be nearer to them, I hightailed it back to my country of origin...Canada. I arrived in February and lived with my dad. By the end of July I had met the man who would eventually be my husband and a week later he moved in with me.

By October we were engaged. By mid-November I was pregnant - oops!. In December we disappointed his family and told them both things. Merry Christmas future in laws! No, I swear I'm not a whore!

2002 saw me marrying the man of my heart. I was 8 months pregnant and you could almost hear the chk-chk of the shotgun. I looked like a hippo in a sundress and he looked...well ... 12.

A month later, at 23 years old, I became the mother to a beautiful baby girl. I felt like the luckiest woman on the face of the Earth. She was cute (for a wrinkly, screaming, pink bundle), she was healthy and she was MINE.

In 2003, I was enjoying being a stay at home mom, and was yearning for another baby. I always wanted 4 or 5 kids, but Hotty Hubby was content to just have ~~none~~ two. By mid-November I found out I was pregnant. Again. Halloween is good to us!

2004 saw the one of the lowest points of the decade for me. Hotty Hubby and I separated. I had somehow convinced myself that there was no return from our few problems and that Girl Spawn and I would be better alone. I felt like I was drowning and that there was no rescue. So we went our separate ways. I refused counselling. So now I was 24, with a toddler, separated from my husband of 18 months, pregnant and without a fucking clue as to what I was doing.

In August, our son was born. All the old feelings came flooding back. Here I was holding another precious soul in my arms. But this time, something was missing. Sure I had my daughter (now 2) and my beautiful baby boy.....but one integral part of my life was missing. And I had finally realised it. Took long enough eh?

We went to counselling. We worked on things. We spent time together and with the kids. We worked it out.

February 2005 saw Hotty Hubby's official return. Honestly...that was the best thing about that whole year. So I'm gonna leave it there.

In 2006 I went back to school to get a Diploma in Legal Office Administration. In 2007 I graduated and got a job at a law firm. The work was fantastic. The boss? Not so much. I'm pretty sure that's about when I started using the word Asshat with any regularity. (Definition: One who has head so far up ass that one is wearing ass as a hat. Asshat.) So I quit in a fit of "I'm stupid and think I don't need your stinking job when in fact I actually do but I'd never admit that to you so I'm going to walk out and pretend everything's ok". Quite possibly one of the stupidest things I've ever done, but I don't regret it really. There's just so many times you can let someone stand and tell you you're stupid when you know you're not.

2008 was another hard year. I lost some people who I thought were good friends, and went through another tough time with HH. He and I came out the other side stronger than ever, but the friendships were gone for good. Looking back, I realise they likely weren't meant to be, but at the time it hurt like hell. The silver lining (because if you look hard enough, there usually is one), is that I met the wonderful woman that I lovingly refer to as Ginger Rug. Not only did she become one of the best friends I have ever had and likely will ever have, but she taught me a lot about myself. Through her, I learned how to love myself, be true to myself, and how to be more present in a more positive way for my family. I will always treasure the friendship that we have, even with all the miles between us now.

It also saw us making the decision to leave Canada and move to New Zealand. While this wasn't as hard a decision for me to make as for hubby, it was still hard. Leaving behind family that I had reconnected with after so many years away and leaving my friends who had become very dear to me....and hubby leaving friends and family...it was all tough. But we thought it was a good decision for us and the kids.

2009? Whirlwind of preparations for our move and then the eventual move itself. It was sad to say goodbye to everyone but we've settled and we're happy.

I let go of my hate for the ~~man~~ ~~boy~~ coward who hurt me so badly as a girl on the precipice of adulthood. That was an even bigger step for me than deciding to move across the world. And it felt GREAT.

There's been a lot of ups and downs in the last decade. But we've come out on top. This year saw the 9th New Year's Eve for HH and me. And for that, I will be forever grateful.

So what about the next decade?

Hubby and I will continue the hard work that goes into our marriage. It is bloody hard work sometimes but it's worth it. I love that man and he loves me. Divorce (in the words of Will Smith) is NOT an option. I hope that I never have to eat those words, but right now we both mean it whole heartedly.

I will keep working on a healthier me. I'm not going to churn out the pithy, cliche resolution of years past saying that I am going to lose weight. That isn't it. I want to be healthy. Whether I lose 20, 50 or 100 pounds, HEALTH is my main goal. Physical AND mental.

I will love my children every day. There are many days when I don't like them a whole lot and have considered buying a cage for them, but I love them daily. I will try to support them in their decisions. It scares me to think that by the time we're ringing in 2020, my children will be 17 and 15. But I look forward to it.

Embrace the new, put away the old.

From my family.....

.....to yours - May the next decade be a great one. And may you never find frogs in your underwear.

And we're back!!

2009-12-31T22:29:00.000-08:00

Welcome back y'all. I'm sure, because it's New Year, that most of you didn't even notice the temporary interruption. But I'm hoping that you'll at least pretend to be observant enough to notice there's been a couple changes around here.

I'd like to thank Badass Geek and his awesome Badass Designs for my new site layout.

I'm so happy to now have navigation buttons up there. I hope you'll use them. At the very least you should check out all the great people on my blogroll. And if you're not on my roll and want to be, let me know.

Also? If you'll all look at the sidebar.....that's right....at the very top.

YES!!

A spectacular, beautiful, wonderful Mind of a Mad Woman button for you to take. Cos you love me. Which you do. You DO!

And on that same note...I think you all should get your own buttons too!!

Happy New Year everyone!!

------------------------------------------------------

Other places you can find me today - Looking For My Feet

Bobbly bits bouncing .... but not for long!

2009-12-28T05:00:00.000-08:00

I don't know if y'all have checked in on Aunt Juicebox recently but yesterday when I swung by her place she had a post up about the blahs. We've all had them. Those post holidays feelings of "Wow I'm glad that shit is over" and "Oh my gawd. I can't believe I ate my child's weight in chocolate" and "Is that it?!". Of course, being me, I denied all knowledge of said blahs and left a comment alluding to the fact that it was all her when in fact half the world is currently trying to decide whether to throw the leftover turkey and chocolate in the garbage or just eat it and get it over with. The truth is, I totally understand the blahs but somehow have managed to avoid most of it this year. I think it has a lot to do with beginning my trek to find my feet BEFORE the holidays. I maintained some semblance of self control (barely!) through the last week and for the first time in years I did not eat everything that wasn't nailed down or held in the clutches of my incredibly hot husband who would sooner die than give up his chocolate.

Another thing I did before the holiday madness fully set in? I fell under the spell of a couple of dictatorial bitches who will now have full control over portions of my life for the next little while. That's right, I'm calling you out Dual Mom and ZGirl! You have lured me in to your lair and there I will stay as I KICK YOUR ASSES at the challenge that you have issued. The lard laden gauntlet has been hurled and smacked me full on in the face.

What does all that mean? I know darlings, the post Christmas lull can slow down the brain cells a tad can't it? Well. What it means for me is this - as of January 2nd, a mere FIVE days from now, I will be taking part in the exercise/weightloss/kill or be killed challenge that the aforementioned "ladies" have issued. And we even have a smexy button to show off! See?

Excuse me a moment while I try and find my sanity. .........

Nope. It's gone.

I will be continuing on my path of eating well but I'll be stepping up the exercise about ten thousandillion notches because like I said a minute ago? I'll be kicking some ass. People from all corners of the interwebs will be taking part and there may or may not be prizes involved. Which will all be coming to me. Why? Because now that I've started the smack talk, how embarrassing would it be to ....shhhhhh...... lose?!!

And just for an added laugh, because I know y'all are just about rolling in the aisles by now, I thought I'd share a tidbit from Dual Mom with you. In my last post, I mentioned that the spawnlets had been given a trampoline for Christmas. DM read that and promptly said:

You know what that trampoline is good for, right? Exercise woman!!! It's perfect. Nothing like jiggling the crap out of your boobs to burn calories!!! Jan 2 is fast approaching!

To which I felt compelled to reply:

You know what the trampoline is NOT good for?? People over it's shamefully high weight limit! It's kind of mortifying!

Seriously folks. This bouncy contraption that is currently taking up space in my backyard, providing hours of endless entertainment for the spawn and will eventually be a source of fun for me when I watch Hotty Hubby try to mow around it, has a weight limit. It's a limit that would be high if I were at my optimal weight, but I'm not. The kids can use it. My mother and step father can use it. Hotty Hubby can even use it! (I'm not sure why I say that like this shouldn't be possible, it's not like the bean pole is a great standard of measurement for all things normal.) But I, sadly, exceed the weight limit. So there it is. The mortification. The fact that I cannot use it, even for exercise.

It's probably a good thing though. I mean, who wants to see that? Boobs and other bobbly bits bouncing around all over the place. It is (a) unattractive (b) dangerous (think black eyes and more!) and (c) too much fun to provide the rest of the family which means that it should be avoided at all costs. It was bad enough when mommy dearest asked me to demonstrate a jumping jack last night. It's hard to do when the temptation is to cross your arms to prevent a wayward boob knocking you out!

Anyrubbish...my point is that I have taken up the challenge. Wednesday will likely show a "Lost it Bitch" post here.....feel free to ignore but rest assured I'll know. I'm like Santa. I see you when you're sleeping. (By the way, I like that new negligee!)

So who will join us? You can check out the deets over HERE at Dual Mom's and grab the button over HERE at ZGirl's.

So? How was it?

2009-12-27T05:00:00.000-08:00

Did you all have a fantabulous Chrismukahkwanzivus?? I'm sure there's other holidays out there that I'm forgetting but short of spending an hour looking them up and then creating a 100 letter word, that's about all you're getting. It was pretty low key here. Hot. Sunny. Beautiful. Laid back.

I went to the Christmas Eve service at church with my mom, stepdad and stepsister. Christmas morning I had to work. Yeah. Apparently old ladies still need showers even on holidays. Who knew? But I was home by 8:30 and we carried on with our morning. Stockings were opened and drooled over (because Santa saw fit to load 'em up with candy), and then we headed to the Christmas morning service, sans hubby, to sing some carols and let the kids share one of their gifts with the congregation. They loved it. Home again to open the rest of the gifts, because as their mother I reserve the right to drag out the morning as long as possible just to see them squirm and also because, as their mother, I reserve the right to temporarily cancel Christmas based on their sucky attitudes that would rival a gremlin at the best times. Call it what you will, but it totally worked. Their behaviour improved immensely for two minutes at a time.

By lunch time, we had all the gifts opened and there were big smiles in the Mad Woman household. Nannee and Poppa, separately, pulled off the two best gifts of 2009 with a trampoline for the backyard (as opposed to the bathroom, Mad Woman?) (bite me!) and a Wii, respectively. It was all I could do to get them to come down off the trampoline long enough to eat and then they were right back up there, bouncing until the sweat was dripping off them.

We had a lovely Christmas lunch over at my mom's house with nary a turkey in sight. The decision was made to avoid all hot stuff and we dined on cold ham, potato salad and coleslaw. It was perfect!! I'll admit I briefly missed the snow, the stuffing, the mashed potatoes and the turkey leg....but only briefly because after lunch we were able to flake out and let the kids play in the sun again.

It's a very different experience, this Christmas-in-the-Summer thing. Last year, we had a foot and a half of snow on the ground. This year I was melting. I have yet to decide which I prefer. I know that many of you are freezing your asses off and are likely shouting "Are you KIDDING me?!" at the computer right now, but I'm serious! On the one hand, it just doesn't feel like Christmas without at least a cold day. Snow is a bonus. A pain in the ass, need to shovel it out of the way, bonus. But on the other hand...SUN!!

I'll let you know next year which way I'm leaning.

So. How was your holiday?? Tell me all about it!

Christmas....Kiwi Style

2009-12-23T22:45:00.001-08:00

It's Christmas Eve here in New Zealand...even if it's only Wednesday for y'all. It's been very warm all day. Sorry. I wanted to wish you all a very Merry Christmas. A Happy Chanukah. A Kick Ass Kwanzaa.

We spent yesterday playing at the park.

Today we had a Christmas Eve sprinkler fest. The kids donned their togs and headed out into the back yard where Hotty Hubby and I tried to soak them. We had intended to break out the Slip 'N' Slide but it was a bit windy and, because I'm terribly unorganized and lazy, we didn't have any pegs. So we went the cheap way.

We had to forgo our usual Christmas Eve meal of Chinese food in favour of spaghetti and garlic bread but it was just as good. A few cheesy ass Christmas movies later and the kids are just about ready to head to bed and dream of Santa.

Because we love you all so much, we wanted to share a twist on "Twas the Night Before Christmas" with you.

A Kiwi Night Before Christmas
by Yvonne Morrison and Deborah Hinde

'Twas the night before Christmas,
and all round the bach,
not a possum was stirring;
not one could we catch.

We'd left on the table
a meat pie and beer;
in hopes that Santa Claus
soon would be here.

We children were snuggled up
in our bunk beds,
while dreams of pavlova
danced in our heads.

And Mum in her nightie,
and Dad in his shorts,
had just settled down
to watch TV sports.

When outside the bach
such a hoo-ha arose,
I woke up at once
from my wonderful doze.

And what did I see,
when I took a peep?
But a miniature tractor
and eight tiny sheep.

With a little old driver,
his dog on his knee.
I knew at once
who this joker might be.

He patted the dog,
and in a voice not unkind,
cried, "Good on ya, boy!
Now, GIT IN BEHIND!"

"Now, Flossy! now, Fluffy!
now, Shaun and Shane!
On, Bossy! on, Buffy!
on, Jason and Wayne!

Up that red tree,
to the top of the bach!
But mind you don't trample
the vegetable patch."

As my sister awoke,
and I turned around,
in through the window
he came with a bound.

He wore a black singlet
and little white shorts,
and stuck on his feet
were gumboots, of course.

His eyes, bright as paua shell,
oh, how they twinkled!
Like an old tuatara,
his skin was all wrinkled!

He had a wide face
and a round, fat tummy,
that looked like he'd eaten
lots that was yummy.

He spoke not a word,
but got down on one knee,
and placed a cricket set
under the tree.

A present for Sis,
one for Dad, one for Mum,
then he turned and he winked
and he held up his thumb.

He jumped on his tractor;
to his dog gave a whistle,
and away they all flew,
as fast as a missile.

I called out, "Thanks,"
as he flew past the gate.
He called back:
"Kia Ora to all, and good on ya mate!"

See y'all on the flip side!! Hope you have a good one!!

A Kind of Magic.....all we're missing is Freddie

2009-12-06T13:50:00.000-08:00

At the risk of sounding like a scratchy, broken record....this is another post that mentions the Great Interview Experiment. Except this time? It's the actual interview! I know! You thought I'd never get there didn't you?

Last year when I did this, I interviewed someone whose blog I'd never read before. This year, the same thing happened. I kind of like it because I get to know someone and I get to go through their blog with a fine toothed mouse button and then think of oddball questions to ask them that have very little to do with their actual blog. On the other hand, it can be difficult to ask a stranger questions without knowing whether it will offend them or not. I seem to have come off lucky in this case though!

I'd like you all to meet Kirsty of Magic27. She's a British woman living in France with her husband and two daughters. And I think she's bloody fascinating...............

~*~*~

First of all, I’m incredibly glad that I have been given the chance to interview you for this whole gig, because now I have another blog to read and that makes me happy. Almost as happy as a pig in muck.

Now. First question - What are you wearing right now? I don’t ask in a weird stalker-ish way, so much as a public service for my readers who have certain tastes and quirks. I guarantee if you say anything other than a clown suit, you’ll have them hooked. They’re great like that.

Well, black jeans that are a little too big (feelgood factor!), a pale pink polo-neck with a grey cotton jumper on top, pink and purple socks and my (long, red) hair is tied back with a black and silver scrunchy. Oh, and if you're interested, a red bra and knickers, both much less sexy than they sound.

I was reading your “20 Vital Things About Me” and was kind of nodding my head as I went down the list until I got to number 12 which is pretty much when I went into weird happy convulsions because my husband thinks I’m the pickiest eater ever. And now I have proof I’m not. Except I need to know this…..do you eat green things now? How about bananas?

Yes, I do eat some green stuff now (but not all, oh no, not all). And I love bananas. If I were still in Britain I probably wouldn't be considered a picky eater at all, but here in France (where they truly do eat some unspeakable stuff, plus my husband will eat ANYTHING) I'm considered a real wimp. I won't eat shellfish, or snails (no surprise there) or frogs' legs, or andouillette (a horrible sausage thing made of unspeakable bits of animal), or many other things (like rabbit, horse, offal..., fish that still has its head on... I could go on and on). There are many, many fruit and vegetables that I never feel like eating (don't actively dislike them, just can't face the thought of eating them) - stuff like oranges (hate the pith and transparent skin stuff), grapes, tomatoes... BUT I have succeeded in deflecting attention off my habits by having a younger daughter who is infinitely WORSE than I ever was (though my elder daughter will eat, or at least try, most things). L is basically a fast-food junkie (in her dreams though not in reality), a carnivore and a pasta freak. No fruit, no vegetables without a struggle.

You have two girls close in age to my own two little spawnlets. My 7 ½ year old is a real cow a lot of the time right now. Do you find the same thing happening with your 8 year old?

My not-quite-8-year-old is actually pretty much OK. Yeah, she has her teenage tantrums and drama queen moments, but basically she's fine. L, on the other hand, can be a real handful. She's cute and bright and funny and charming... on her own. She gets on fine with her big sister for a while (quite a long while, even), but eventually the whining, sniping, kicking, biting, hitting or whatever will start. She's a real spitfire! I'm dreading her adolescence already!

Tell us a random (and perhaps juicy) fact about yourself. We live for this kind of thing.

This is tough! My life is quite dull, really... Hmmm... Let's go back in time a bit, to when things weren't quite so dull... When I was a student in Spain I was assaulted by a very over-eager Spanish guy. As I ran away (don't know how I managed to get away, in fact: he was a soldier and much bigger than me) I slipped on some stairs and tore the ligaments in my ankle. Totally craptastic day.

You spend a lot of time up in the middle of the night when us folks who claim to be normal are usually attempting to sleep. Are you a night owl by nature or is it a natural by-product of having children?

Oh, totally by nature. As a student, I chose courses by what time of day they were (when possible) and avoided morning ones. I've always liked working late at night and find it impossible to go to bed early. I can be exhausted at 7 pm, and ready to go to bed, but of course I can't as there's too much to do at that time of night. And then, by about 10 pm, I'm raring to go once again. It's terrible!

What do you think you’d be like if you lived in the 1800s? Personally I think I’d die a horrible slow death from starvation because there ain’t no way you’d get me doing hard work out in the fields or slaughtering animals (I leave that to the pros..no offence to the vegetarians).

Well, given my current financial status and "career" prospects, I would imagine that I'd have been a poor governess or something. Nothing rich and fancy, that's for sure. And I'd probably have died of some ghastly disease, too.

If I was to win a whole lot of money and decide to spend it on making a movie about you instead of frittering it away on booze, houses and clothes……what would the movie be called and which hot starlet would play you? And who would you pick for your leading man?

Obviously, I'd like to be played by a glamorous Hollywood star with red hair (not that there are many of those), someone like Julianne Moore for example. But I suspect the film would be less glamorous than that, probably starring the chubbed-up version of Renée Zellwegger with her hair dyed red. My ideal leading man would be Johnny Depp (swooooooonnnn). And the title? "Reasonably content but going nowhere". Not very snappy, I know, but appropriate.

This is a very important question. Do you like scary roller coasters? Do you scream like a little girl while you crap your pants or do you throw your hands up in delight and laugh at all the losers puking up the 12 corndogs that they ate before getting on the ride?

I haven't been on a real rollercoaster for about 20 years, but I loved them back then. Now, aged as I am, I suspect I'd barf. But I'm not particularly scared.

If you knew that there was zero chance of it resulting in a big fat fail, what would you do?

If success were guaranteed, I'd launch myself as a writer and artist. I've always believed I have some kind of artistic talent, but have never really found exactly what it is. My NaNoWriMo made me proud of myself, just for the fact of doing it, but I know I'll never have the courage to show it to anyone.

Why did you decide to start your blog? Do you think you’ll keep it going for years and years until your kids are starting their own or is it just a flash in the pan kind of thing? Will us bribing you with chocolate make any difference to your answer?

I started it as a kind of diary, knowing that almost no one would ever read it. In fact, I don't want anyone I actually know to read it (particularly my mother-in-law, I'm not very flattering about her!). But I enjoy it and don't intend to stop. I need to do NaBloPoMo every now and then to discipline me into posting regularly, though. And all bribes of chocolate will be accepted very gladly. Particularly Cadbury's Dairy Milk... yum!

I know it'll be hard to answer this one because I'm not sure even *I* could pick a fave from your blog after going through all your posts (I told you...stalker!) but what is your favourite blog entry from the past year and a half of blogging?

That's probably this one (Mirror, Mirror) because it's the one that rings the most true. I really don't look the way I think I look, which makes me wonder what other people must make of me. I buy clothes because I think they'll look good on me but in fact, I suspect that most of them probably don't. So the "Mirror, mirror" thing is horribly realistic. Mirrors depress me (my hair! my skin! my teeth! my wrinkles! my legs! my muffin! GAAAAHHHH).

What is your pet peeve? Like, what really annoys you, gets your goat, makes steam come out your ears like Wiley Coyote?

Oh, this is easy: the average French person's lack of civility. Sweeping generalisation, of course, but just try walking around a French city (I've tried several, they're all the same). French people won't step out of your way, won't hold doors open, won't use just one side of an escalator to allow people in a hurry to run up quickly, don't give up their seats for old people, can't queue to save their lives and are, in general, deeply, deeply selfish. That doesn't mean they can't be lovely people when you get to know them, but common courtesy and stuff mean NOTHING to these people and it drives me BATSHIT. I've lived in France since 1992 and STILL haven't got used to it!

I've often said, publicly, that my boobs are my best feature....what do you think is yours? And along those same lines (if you think on wobbly wiggly lines like I do), what is your worst habit?

I have pretty low self-esteem, so this is hard. Despite my hideous white skin, I think I probably like my neck and shoulders best. Quite a long neck, narrow and slender shoulders. In stark contrast with my muffin top and blubbery thighs. As for my worst habit: that's easier: chewing my lip. I've tried every lip balm known to man, none of them stop my lips from chapping and when I feel that little flap of skin, I just have to pull it off. Gross, I know, but hey, that's what bad habits are all about!

And finally....

If the whole world was listening (and a small portion of it IS right now), what would you say?

If the whole world were listening to me, I think I would say something either really pretentious like "stop fighting about religion and get to grips with keeping the planet safe" or else something totally daft like "make cakes no war". Yeah, I'm pretty anti-religion (even if my daughters are in a Catholic school - how did that happen?!) and very anti-war...

Thanks for playing Kirsty!! Now....go eat some green veggies and frog legs. *Gag*

Shock and awe

2009-12-03T12:54:00.000-08:00

Wow! Before I get to anything else, I have a couple of thank yous to put out there.

THANK YOU....to all of you for your lovely comments and thoughts since my last post about the painful truth when it hits you in the face. They've really helped me get through the last week and carry on into this one. It was a very difficult post to write, but in a way therapeutic. Some of you have even come over and started following my other blog...so cheers! Although I don't know the vast majority of you personally, I do feel like I "know" many of you. And you all rock!

Also, THANK YOU to Aunt Juicebox over at Bacon Is My Lover. Aside from the fact that a good few of you who made your way here for that last post came from her place, she spun off from my post and did one about her own journey of weightloss. These kind of posts are hard to do, for anyone. So thanks Aunty J for opening your heart. And an extra thank you for creating a list of folks who are doing their own now too. You rock!

Ok.....now that the sentimental stuff is out of the way, what do I have to talk about? Not a lot unfortunately.

** I didn't get the job I was hoping for. But I'm applying for more. I guess I'm thankful that I do already have a job that is bringing in SOME cash.

** I lost 800 grams this week at the Rotund Round Up. That's 1.74 pounds for the rest of you. It's non refundable, so don't even try to give it back to me.

** Girl Spawn won Champion Penguin of the Year at St. John's Ambulance Youth. (Penguins are the 5 to 7 year old cadets). Hotty Hubby and I were shocked when we heard her name called at the Prize Giving and full of smiles as we watched her proudly march herself up on stage to shake the guy's hand. She's loving being part of the cadets and is very enthusiastic about it all, so we're glad she was honoured this way.

** I'm told Christmas is coming. I'm still rather in denial about the whole thing but the spawn are getting more and more excited about it all. I think it's going to be a bit of a sparse on this year, but you know what? I don't really care. Christmas is meant to be about time with family, with the people we love and care about. The kids are happy as long as there is something under the tree.

** I've not been getting much blog reading done lately. I'm sorry about that...I'll some done this afternoon...ish. I hope you're all well.

Over and out!!

The truth hurts....

2009-11-28T05:00:00.000-08:00

I published this a couple of days ago on my other blog, "Looking For My Feet". I've been blogging about my weightloss journey with Weight Watchers over there so as not to clog up this space. But, I thought this one might be worth cross posting. So...here ya go. (slightly edited to make it work here)

*****

It's true what they say. "They" being the powers that be that decide on what words will make up the numerous cheesy cliches that we use. And today "they" were proved right. Which of course made me want to hunt them down and tie them to the front of a train, but that's beside the point.

Where was I before I so rudely digressed? Oh yes. It's true what they say. The truth hurts. It's like a punch to the head, or someone giving you a supreme truth wedgie. Hurts like a ....well....like worse than birthing my kids.

How does it hurt? Ah well my lovelies, you are smart to ask.

Oh let me list the ways....

1) Although I already have a job, it doesn't give me very many hours and it isn't what I went back to school to get trained for. So, I've carried on looking for employment in my field. I've sent out letters and resumes to all and sundry and not having too much luck. The job market here is not as great as I might like right now. But yesterday I got a phone call from a firm here in town who I have now applied to twice. Could I please come in for an "informal discussion" (read: interview that stresses me out beyond belief)? Absolutely!

This, of course, presented me with a problem. No. Nice. Clothes. Well I'll just go shopping. HA! Yeah right. This might be a relatively easy feat for you folks who fit nicely into the societal norm of what size we should be and, as a result, the averages sizes that the designers churn out. However, for a someone my size who more closely resembles the prize cow in the field down the road than Heidi Klum, it can be a tad more difficult.

As I dragged my extremely shopping resistant spawnlets (they come by it honestly. I hate shopping.) around the store trying to find something interview appropriate, I found myself on the verge of tears. So many gorgeous shirts, skirts, pants, dresses and jackets.....all in sizes smaller than I can even dream of fitting into right now. I finally found the "oversize" area (yeah..heaven forbid they call it "plus size" like the rest of the world, they have to label us like the back of those Mack Trucks hauling friggin' houses!) and guess what? Sweet F All!

Ok, that's not strictly true. I did find a pair of pants in a lovely grey colour that were my size. I tried them on and couldn't decide what was wrong with them. But something was. So I bought them (because I'm stupid) and brought them home to model for my mother. She kindly pointed out that because I'd got them big enough to go up over my ass just to get them to my waist, I now had pants that were too big in the ass and I looked like I was wearing saddlebags. Ok. The pants were returned, I spent another HOUR wandering all (two) of the "Heffers Shop Here" aisles and finally found a nice dressy pair of capris that look quite fetching on me.

All in all though, a very humbling and tear inducing experience. One I'd rather not repeat til I've lost a few ~~dozen~~ more kilos.

The truth is, I'm too heavy to shop happily. That truth hurts.

2) (This one will be shorter I promise!) One of the requirements for this job I interviewed for was that the applicant have "excellent presentation skills, both in manner and appearance". Well, I might come across as an uncouth redneck idiot ~~whenever I open my mouth~~ at times, but when it comes down to it I can sound pretty darn intelligent. Also? I clean up pretty good...my size aside.

When talking about this aspect of the job description with my mother, she pointed that my size might be a distinct DISadvantage for me. Huh? Yeah. I was all "Nuh-UH! They can't discriminate based on the size of my ass!" And she's all "Oh yeah they can. You are presenting the face of their firm and let's face it, a thin person would look better....they can be very selective when it comes to that."

(Note: NOT a direct quote from mother dearest, I'm paraphrasing and perhaps using what I heard as opposed to what she actually said because I'm pretty sure she put it more eloquently than that.)

Once I picked my jaw up off the floor (where, by the way, there was NO food!) and fought back the tears that were welling up, I proceeded to put that little ditty on a loop in my head where it played over and over and over and over and over again until AFTER my interview today.

The truth is, she's right. Given the choice between me and some skinny minny with the same qualifications and experience, they'll likely choose skinny because she looks better for them. And that truth hurts.

3) Children are, up to a certain age, brutally honest. Horribly so. When I went to pick up the spawnlets from school today, I was still all gussied up from my "informal discussion". As I walked down the hallway towards Girl Spawn's classroom, a bunch of kids were walking towards me. A couple of the girls started giggling with each other and I didn't think much of it.....until they got just past me.

"Oh. My. Gosh! Did you see how FAT she was?!" (like I'm the only queen size mama in the whole freakin' school?)

I brushed it off, filed it in the back of my head to put spiders in the offending kid's backpack, and kept walking. Then I heard more giggling and...

"Hahaha yeah she was big! Even MY mom's not that big."

"She looks like she's going to have a baby"

"Maybe she is!"

"Nuh-UH! She's just fat. Hahahahahaha! Like a cow!"

"Shhhhh!!! She can totally hear us!" (ok, you get a free pass for that one...this time.)

I had to leave. I went back out to my car and sat there and cried. It would have hurt to hear coming from anyone's mouth, but after the last 24 hours it hurt more somehow. I just sat there and cried for about 10 minutes before I was finally brave enough to waddle back into the school.

The truth is, she was right. I AM fat. And I DO look like I'm going to have a baby. And that truth hurts. A LOT.

But you know what? That's exactly why I'm doing this journey. One. Last. Time. So that eventually when I go shopping, I can shop on the same racks as my sister. (ok, that might be a stretch...she looks like a model) So that when I go for an interview, I know they're looking more at my qualifications and my boobs than they are at the size of my stomach. So that my kids don't have to worry about having the "fat mom".

And more than anything, so that I can live.

The truth hurts, but sometimes the pain is worth it in the long run.

Some people have all the fun

2009-11-27T08:00:00.000-08:00

The lovely Moonspun is currently off roaming the countryside on a magical mystery adventure, and in her absence she asked a few of us to guest post for her. Once I got past being honoured and then scared shitless, I agreed to do it. Because she's awesome and it's not like I have anything else to do right? (Ok the dust bunnies still battling it out behind my tv cabinet might disagree with that, but I'm sticking with that story.)

Today, I'm over there. Mumma Boo and I are starring as left and right boobs in a hooker red bra with black lace trim (that'll get the Google perves going). I'm the left boob today. So head on over and see what we have to say about the upcoming holidays.

Help For Anissa

2009-11-18T11:57:00.000-08:00

Apparently, I have not been in my usual places at the usual times, so it was not until very late last night that I even caught wind of what has been going on since early yesterday. The entire blogosphere is coming together to talk about, to help, to try and do something...ANYTHING...to help this family.

Many of you might know Anissa Mayhew from Aiming Low. Honestly, I've pretty much just lurked over there because I never feel I have anything of value (or of wit) to say. But I love being there and seeing what they all have to say. Anissa is funny, honest, witty, awesome and so many other things. But right now? She and her family need our help. All of us. That includes you. And you.

I first heard about this on Twitter, and have since read more about it at Aiming Low and over at The Spohrs. I hope they will both forgive me for copying and pasting the original post, but I figured there are some of you out there who just want to know NOW without having to click through a million links, what is going on.

As you may have heard, Anissa, our beloved friend and leader at Aiming Low, suffered a stroke on Tuesday afternoon. She is in the hospital right now, in the ICU.

More than anything, Anissa needs your prayers and positive thoughts but to the many people in the Atlanta area who have offered help to the Mayhew family, we have set up a form for you to fill out so we can have everyone’s contact info in one place (please be assured your information will be kept private). If you are NOT in the Atlanta area but still want to help, you can also leave your information on that form.

Things that would be helpful right now are gift cards to restaurants and gift cards to the movies or to Blockbuster (to help keep the kids occupied) and gas/hotel gift cards for her extended family. We will be setting up a PO Box on Wednesday and posting the address here along with any updates. Please don’t send anything to the hospital or the Mayhew home. If you have questions, please email helpforanissa@gmail.com

We ask that you please respect the Mayhew family’s privacy by NOT calling the hospital and we thank you all SO MUCH for your outpouring of love and support for Anissa and her family.

With thanks and love,
The Aiming Low Team

UPDATE: An address has been set up to send cards and packages:
860 Johnson Ferry Road 140-184
Atlanta, GA 30342

Since then, over at the CaringBridge site set up for Anissa and her family, her husband has been posting updates. The latest of which is:

12 pm Eastern UPDATE FROM ANISSA’S HUSBAND:

What we know is she had a massive stroke.

She bled into the brainstem and pons areas of the brain. She is no longer sedated but still unconcious and unresponsive. Vitals are mostly stable except for a lowgrade fever most likely due to the damage to the pons. The pons control the bodies ability to regulate temperature. She is still on a vent and it is unclear if she is capable of breathing on her own. She has had an mri/mra/ct today. An eeg is pending. We’re in a waiting game now for survival first, and ultimately for her to wake up.

I'm pretty sure you can all understand the seriousness of this whole situation. I know that there are some of you out there who can, and likely will, donate something. I am also aware that there are those of you who can't, but might be able to put together a care package for those beautiful children of hers. More than anything though....spare a few prayers and thoughts for the family. This won't be easy on them.

Anissa...everyone's rooting for you lady. Come on back to us. Come on back to your kiddies.

To Write Love On Her Arms

2009-11-11T11:56:00.001-08:00

I came across this cause last year....but I was too late to participate. This year, I'm in. In like slim.

To Write Love On Her Arms (TWLOHA) is :

...a non-profit movement dedicated to presenting hope and finding help for people struggling with depression, addiction, self-injury and suicide.

I have struggled with depression myself, and while I'm doing great right now, I know what it is to hit bottom. I know what it feels like to wonder if you're ever going to be able to climb up out of the depths and see just a sliver of light again. That intense feeling of loneliness can be overwhelming, and the question is always there in the front of your brain (no matter how hard you try to shove it to the back or do away with it altogether)... "Does anyone even care?"

And while I'm doing well now, and I know that people DO care, I am also fully aware that should I start taking on water and sinking into the abyss again, I will feel incredibly alone all over again. It's a horrible feeling that no one should ever have to experience and yet people all over the world go through these feelings on a daily basis. It brings you to the brink of desperation and some people have trouble clawing their way back from that. To be suicidal is a horrible feeling. To think that there is no one who cares, leaves you feeling empty.

TWLOHA was formed as a result of one of their friends who had been turned away from a treatment centre. They wanted to help. And help they did. Since then, they have helped many many others.

Ok, so maybe you're sitting there thinking "What the hell does this have to do with me?". It has EVERYTHING to do with you. Chances are, even if they're not open about it or it's not obvious, you know someone who suffers from depression. Or is addicted to something that they would give anything to kick, but don't feel that they have the energy or support to do so. You probably know someone who has attempted suicide......maybe even someone who, sadly, was successful. I promise you, there is someone in your life who is going through something and just wants to know that there is someone, anyone, out there who gives a shit about them.

So. This Friday the 13th of November, ignore the normal superstitions surrounding the day. Put aside your party planning for a day. This Friday, DO something.

"But WHAT?!", you say.

Well, for a start, you can write LOVE on your arms. Take a picture of it and if you're on Facebook, submit to the fan site and/or group .

Everytime someone sees that word "LOVE" written on your arms on Friday, explain to them why you've done it and what it means to you and so many other people out there in the world.

Buy a TWLOHA shirt...or just donate.

Most of my readers are in the US. That's great, that's where this awesome cause is based and that's where most of the work gets done. But you know what? I'm in New Zealand, and was in Canada. I have friends in the UK who are doing this. Because even if we don't donate the cash, we're still getting the word out there. People are still asking why we've written such a powerful word on our arms and we're still getting to explain it. THAT is important.

People NEED to understand that depression, addiction, suicide or self harm are NOT taboo subjects anymore. They are subjects that desperately need to be addressed and those people need help.

Will you join me on Friday the 13th? Will you write that most powerful word...LOVE....on your arms? Will you tell people why?

***UPDATE of Friday the 13th.....here's me, writing LOVE on my arm.

Shakespeare, Take Me Away!

2009-11-05T08:00:00.000-08:00

I'm pretty sure you all know about my love affair with the written word. I love me my books and if I like one enough, I'll tell you all about it here, because I think that you should also be able to roll around in the world portrayed.

Something else I love? Book stores. And libraries. You know that shiver that runs down your spine when someone touches you in just the right way? Yeah, you know. I know you do. Well, have you ever had that same feeling when you walk into a building? Or see a picture of something you love portrayed in a beautiful way?

No?

Well. You're missing out then folks!

There was a bookstore in a town I used to live in and I loved going in there. It wasn't huge, it wasn't even particularly pretty. But the books had that old, loved smell and I could hang out in there for hours. I'd run my hands along the shelves, feeling the hard spines of the books and watching the dust fly off the really old ones. I'd find myself a chair and sit there flicking through the pages of an old classic while listening to the rest of the books calling me, begging to be held and read.

I haven't found another shop like it. There IS a shop here in town (which I fully intend to frequent every couple of weeks) called StillBooks and they not only sell distillery stuff, but books too. Last time I was in there, they had a whole schwack of old books for cheap cheap prices. I'm talking Rudyard Kipling collections published in 1903...for TEN DOLLARS!! $10!!!! Yeah, I'll be taking advantage of that. Now all I need is a bookcase.

Libraries are also special to me, but mostly for financial purposes. If money was no object, then I would have walls and walls of books. Old ones, new ones, classics, oddities.....it wouldn't matter to me. But sadly, money IS an issue and so I resort to raiding the library 10 books at a time. And in some parts of the world, there are amazing libraries!

Hotty Hubby forwarded me a link from The Nonist where he had found a book by Candida Höfer and it showed a whole bunch of great libraries of the world. Some of them are truly, truly amazing and I wish I could visit them all and just stand there and smell the air. (Yes, I'm aware of how creepy that sounds.)

But then I found some even better pictures.

Like this bookstore in China.......for kids!

Or this one in Buenos Aires.....

But my personal favourite was this teeny tiny one that reminded me of the one I used to like to haunt.

This one is in Paris. I now have an overwhelming desire to go there, purely for this one store..

You can check out the rest of the pics and actual details and interesting stories behind these bookstores at THIS LINK HERE. That's where these pics came from.

So what does it for you? Are you like me and the thought of a bunch of old books all huddled together totally gets you going? Or is it shoes/clothes/food/sex toys/something else that you're too embarrassed to mention?

Tell me!

Wordless Wednesday (mostly)

2009-11-04T08:00:00.000-08:00

Marlborough Anniversary was this past weekend. Here's a few snapshots from the parade....

This is the District Band, First Class Brass Band and Air Force Band. My mom plays with them.

Girl Spawn in her first ever parade. She's a St. John's Ambulance Youth member.