Titillating SATURDAY: Just because I can

Kristin: Mom, I drew Mat Man!

Me: Is that Mat Man? What's he doing?

Kristin: He's juggling... he's juggling chocolate pudding.

Mmhmm...

---

Here's a bonus shot of Ninja Cat with the flower necklace Mike made for her. She liked it for about ten minutes. She spent the following ten minutes beating the crap out of it.

Oh, you fickle Ninja Cat...

---

I'm putting together a journal of what I've covered with my piano student thus far. (Keep in mind I'm not a trained/licensed/certified piano anything. I'm just some person who's been playing piano for over 20 years recreationally.)

Problem is, I can hardly remember yesterday, let alone 7 weeks ago.

---

I cook for my family every single day, whether it be a huge supper or small breakfasts.

So why do the girls insist on referring back to my parents as if I never cook for them?

Chili??? I love chili... just like Grandma makes.

Can we have pancakes for breakfast. I love "Grandpa's cakes"!

I think my parents are brainwashing them with food whenever they get my kids alone.

---

Note to self: When the kids eat too many carrots, bathroom breaks become an exciting new adventure called Look-at-this-giant-orange-snake-I-made Time.

Note to self: When Mike plugs the toilet, make him plunge it out. There is nothing humane about what I went through this morning.

---

I'm pretty sure Mike thinks he's a frat boy.

He goes to work, makes crude jokes with the guys all day, then comes home to live on the couch.

While home, he eats food other people buy/make, he plays video games, watches movies, surfs the web, and doesn't pick up after himself, and he has a beer or two then sleeps in. He doesn't cut his hair, and he would spend all day in his pajamas if he could.

Dear Mike, If you wanted to go to college and live the frat life, you should have thought about that when you were busy getting drunk all through high school instead of studying. This kind of lifestyle - past 25 - puts men in the "loser" category. Unless you're a professional athlete and/or Colin Ferrell.

Let this be a lesson to all you high schoolers out there.

---

I'm tired and craving chocolate. (I hate chocolate, but I made a batch of puppy chow last night just so I could have some.) I'm not pregnant, I'm just out of caffeine.

Help. Please, oh please. Send help.

---

Happy Saturday!

PS - New SNL tonight. Unless it's not. (And then I'll be pissed. I only remember to watch when it's reruns.)

It's Friday. I hope you're bored.

We had Parent-Teacher Conferences this afternoon. (Have I mentioned that? Because we did. Parent-Teacher Conferences. And I remembered, and we were on time. Phew.)

I heard what I already knew: my children are very smart, but it's hard to get that from talking to them since they don't talk. All three teachers said the girls are improving on their social skills, but that's like telling a 500-pound woman she's skinnier than a school bus - there's a lot of room for improvement.

First we went to Kristin's room. I love Kristin's teacher. I didn't realize she teaches a class of TEN students with THREE assistants. (Four of those kids are special needs students.) No wonder our school district is the shiznit.

Anyway, Mrs. L is so energetic and silly and genuinely loves her job and her kids. She's also like a decade younger than I am, which is saying something since I'm practically a fetus. (Am I right?)

She told me that Kristin is an ace academically. Counting. Letters. Phonics. Art. And oh the patterns! Where's my shocked face? She also said that Kristin loves to cut. No way. I wouldn't have known that, since every time I give her crayons, paper and scissors, she immediately cuts her paper into confetti-sized bits.

The only sorta-kinda-not-great mark on her report card was that she didn't spend time learning about "technology." And I quote: That tiny computer in the corner is the only source of technology we have for the kids... besides the light switches. And it's not even hooked up to the internet. We have ancient CD games.

I'm not concerned... that girl is obsessed with our Fisher Price keyboard. I have to beat her back with a stick to get a little mommy computer time.

So no shock with Kristin. Oh, and no turd submarines, in case you were waiting on that verdict.

Then Mrs. L handed me a stack of pages with drawings and explanations on the back. Things like: The gorilla has a nose and a mouth. His name is Gorilla and he has a mom. and Mommy is standing around a Christmas tree. (This one accompanies a giant stick person engulfing a colorful triangle.)

But my favorite, by far is this one:

with the caption: I have a yellow egg and Mommy is cooking it. My cat is meowing.

(Because, seriously, this describes most days in our house. I'm cooking for the kids. And that fucking asshole Ninja Cat is running under my feet meowing at me for tuna. Art imitating life.)

After that, we went to Alison's room. Alison's teacher is almost the polar opposite. Mrs. S doesn't make eye contact very much, and she is very by-the-book. Must be fun to have an odd little duckling like Alison in her class. Yes, Monkey's wearing an elephant and holding a giraffe... it's a zoo here.

Alison's academic reviews were similar, but from knowing my daughter, I'm sure she acts like she doesn't care about any of that silly school stuff. She only goes to school to play with their kitchen set.

I was a little irritated when I saw that my child pretended not to know what shape a diamond was. They've known their shapes since they were two (including octagon, hexagon, semicircle, etc... pretty much all the shapes that have Daddy counting on his fingers). Little turd.

Finally we visited Emma's teacher, Mrs. M. Mrs. M thinks Emma is the cutest thing ever and swore she would kidnap her if she could. Should I warn her that Emma has a psychotic streak, as evidenced by her artwork? (Remember that happy little birdie she made yesterday? Well, this morning she drew a happy little dolphin to "play" with that birdie... a villainously happy dolphin.)

Crazy drawings and socially introverted? She must be a genius, too.

Mrs. M showed me "stories" that Emma drew and narrated. Usually the teacher jump-started things with a question. By the end, all three of us adults were laughing.

What do your mom and dad do at work? They go fishing. They go to the park.

What do you want to be when you grow up? I want to be a fireman.

What are you thankful for? I am thankful for a rocket.

What did you do over Thanksgiving break? We went to the fireworks and fishing. There were animals because there were monsters and ghosts in my bedroom.

How do you celebrate the holiday? Kristin, Emma and Alison go to the beach and see the Christmas tree. (Yeah, can they invite me along next time they have a holiday like that?)

What do you do outside when there's snow? I get a fireplace outside and I add sticks to it. My mom, Alison and Kristin watch me. There is a big cloud. I put on my snow pants and socks.

Who do you love? I love Kristin, Emma, Alison, froggy and doggy.

And I finally solved the Lucas mystery. Every day, Emma was coming home talking about playing dolls with a kid named Lucas. And every day, I started to wonder a little more if Lucas didn't have a bit of a feminine streak or a little crush on my Emmy. Evidently he's her "centers partner," so where one goes to play, the other must follow. Poor, poor, poorpoorpoor Lucas.

Back to the important stuff here... Yay! All my children are brilliant. Mission accomplished. Time to put in my 2-week notice.

After all that excitement, I hit 6:30 and crashed hard. I need a break.

Or maybe just caffeine. Like a dolt, I forgot to restock.

But what I did remember? The conferences. (I can stop waking up in cold sweats now.)

All our ducks are the odd ducks out

Emmy is my artist.

I love seeing her bird friends when I'm least expecting them. I don't know why, but she draws lots of birds and they never look similar. She also draws monsters. Big, fat, happy, "daddy monsters" alongside little, tiny, "baby monsters."

I could ask her any day of the week if she'd rather watch a movie or draw pictures, and she'd choose to draw every time.

Alison, on the other hand, likes to draw letters - usually her name - over and over and over again until the letters loop around and over each other like paint on a Jackson Pollock. Slightly egocentric, no?

Kristin is absolutely insane. She draws circles. O. O. O. O. O. O. Look, Mom! Spaghettios! or Look, Mom! Ladybugs! or Look, Mom! Blood drops of the innocent!

I love my little Squirrel. She reminds me of me when I was young: a titch anal-retentive, fiercely independent, and more than a bit odd. (Before I realized she was weird, I thought she was Autistic. She'd stack all the legos by size and shape and color, then separate them and do it again. As a toddler. My mom is convinced she's a genius.)

There are no black sheep in this family. We're all a little weird. It's a requirement.

I'll find out just how smart and artistic and insane my children are this afternoon.... PARENT-TEACHER CONFERENCES. And I'll remember to go this time, I swear.

I have a feeling we're gonna get "talked to" about my children's tendency to leave submarines in the toilet bathroom habits. Even so, I've been pretty excited about this all week because I am a huge nerd.

It's gonna be the best 45 minutes of my week, sadly enough.

What the hell did I do all day?

Woke up.

Scooped Alison off the livingroom floor and plunked her back in bed.

Sat on the couch in a daze for an hour until the girls woke up.

Fed the girls Mini-Breakfast. Then cooked Second Breakfast of eggs and bacon. Because my kids are "grazers" and eat twenty times a day.

Flushed the toilets. Several times.

Looked at the clock and realized it was already after 11. Shuffled all the kids' crap into their backpacks and filled the two snack buckets with enough carrots and dip to feed Ethiopia, then convinced Mike through mockery and intimidation that he needed to cart the girls to school.

Got the skinny on last night's sleepwalking shenanigans from Mike. (I'd evidently walked down the hallway, mumbling, scolding Mike for not getting the bread out of the machine fast enough, then slowly came out of it and said, I did it again. Now I'm gonna try to get back to sleep. Good story, huh?)

Fell asleep involuntarily.

Woke up nearly having a heart attack when the phone rang and I was sure it was the school calling to ask why I wasn't there.

Had a visitor. Mike thought at first glance it was Jehovah's Witnesses (he saw pamphlets) but it turned out to be my buddy dropping off some Aflac info so I can pimp her name. Thankfully she doesn't care if I'm braless at 1 PM.

Put on a bra.

Picked the kids up from school and was disappointed that elementary had no class today. Missed an opportunity to glare at my arch nemesis aka The Drunkard Whore of the Parking Lot. Funny that she drives a black Suburban and I drive a white one... it's like the Dark Side vs. Lite Beer.

Came home and gave Miss A an extended piano lesson to make up for last week when I cancelled due to plague. Realized this girl is my sister reincarnated and is going to take me for all the glitter stickers I own. Made a mental note to buy more. Many, many, many more.

Flushed a turd mid-lesson.

Perched children on the chair to watch after they couldn't stand to be away from the "pretty music" any longer. Kristin perched herself on the chair later after Ninja Cat threatened to attack her.

Ate way too much pulled turkey. Who would've thought that after being wrist-deep in a carcass for an hour, one could still manage to consume it?

Flushed a few more toilets. Told girls they need to start flushing after themselves before I lose my mind.

Watched as the girls spelled with magnetic letters important words such as ROW, DUCK, and DVD. Yes, DVD.

Suppressed the memory of the rest of the evening. Realized we'd made it through the night and the girls are now sleeping peacefully... while camped out on the livingroom floor.

Fielded my twentieth phone call (tonight) from Mike asking about bikes for his RAGBRAI trip in July. IN JULY. Good god, I love you, but I'm not afraid to cut your tongue out.

Sat at the computer and thought, What the hell did I do all day?

Titillating Tuesday: The soul-stealing edition

I tried something new last night. My mom would call it "going to bed at a decent hour."

Then I was proven right once again. I woke up while sleepwalking because I was convinced that someone was kidnapped and held inside my house.

Note to self: more Pepsi, less sleep.

---

I think my girls see my ghost friend, too.

Kristin came home from my parents' house this Sunday and stood against the wall in her room, completely terrified. It was mid-afternoon, but she said she saw someone in the bathroom.

It could be just a childhood thing, but I'm starting to wonder.

My parents' house - if you believe in this sort of thing - is supposedly haunted by the wife of the original owner (late 1800s), and the girls talk about seeing a "shadow" person whenever they spend the night.

Doo-dee-doodoo, doo-dee-doodoo... hahaha. Yeah, I'm not convinced. I'm still pretty sure my ghost guy is a manifestation of my sexual frustrations combined with a high caffeine to blood ratio.

---

There are people in the world so untouched by technology that they believe their soul is stolen a little bit every time someone takes their picture.

My children aren't familiar with that theory.

Mom. Mom. C'you take my picture. Can I see it?

Sometimes they don't sit still long enough to get their faces in the frame before they're running around behind the camera to see themselves.

It's been a narcissistic week in our household. First I cleaned off the girls' mirror (they have a full-length mirror in their bedroom, but it had been covered with crayon and stickers until two days ago) which Alison immediately took to posing in front of, and now we're holding impromptu photo shoots.

---

The girls have many, many nicknames. Mostly animals.

This is Kristin.

Squirrel. Tritty-monkey. Pancake head. The little one. Stinky. Peanut. Scrawny.

This is Alison.

Monkey. Donkey. Big Al. Fatty McGee. Mike, Jr.

And then Emma.

Emmy. Turd nugget. Little Miss Shy Pants. Squeaky britches. Little Baby Round Head.

When I asked Kristin what animal nickname we should give Emma (since she's the only one to escape without one), she thought so hard it looked painful. Then she smiled and said, The Goat. Not just "goat," but "THE goat."

Emma, you are now: The Goat.

---

Before you send the hate mail, the girls love their nicknames. So don't tell me my 36-pound five-year-old is gonna get an eating disorder because we call her Fatty. It's supposed to be ironic.

---

From left to right, in order of least to most hair removed in ScissorGate 2009.

---

Yesterday looked like a gorgeous day.

It lied.

I walked out into the sunshine with my thin winter coat and let out a few cuss-words when the 21 degree air hit my face. It was then I decided the snow would have to melt off the driveway.

---

I married a twelve-year-old girl.

Last night at Target, we walked through the book section. Mike stopped, pointed out a series of books, and said, Looks like there are going to be more movies.

He was talking about Percy Jackson and the Quivering Teenage Trident, or whatever it's called.

And the look he gave was not the correct male response of disgust, but one of curiosity.

Erin, you want him?

---

The guy we pay to plow our driveway has decided that - since we have to park our cars on our driveway overnight - he's going to forego cleaning off the pavement and continue to plow diagonal swipes eight feet into our grass.

I wonder what would happen if I park on the grass...

---

Happy Tuesday!

Arts n' crack

I swear my doctor prescribed me cocaine.

I'm on these steroids that are supposed to reduce my swelling. I had to crush the pills up like a drug dealer before taking them, which made me pause at what the scene would look like to an outsider.

They made me feel like I could do anything.

Like go to bed at 4:30 AM and wake up three hours later all bright-eyed and bushy-tailed. (There's a pervy joke there somewhere, but I'll leave it be.)

Or cut over 300 squares for a quilt I suddenly decided to make out of old t-shirts.

Wanna see the grossness that's causing all this trouble?

Here it comes...

.

.

.

.

.

.

Ta-daaaa!!!!

Check out that strep racing stripe and swollen, red tonsils and throat. Gaw-jus. Who wants a kiss?

That throat is why my parents swooped in yesterday morning and stole the kids for a day-and-a-half.

It's how I napped half of Saturday and spent the other half in Urgent Care.

It's how I got totally hopped up on steroids and antibiotics today and scrubbed the entire house clean with PineSol while the neighbors looked on wondering if they should call Al-Anon. Even Mike walked in and asked, Are you on meth??? as I furiously scrubbed at a crayon mark on the wall.

But there's some good news here in all of this.

My parents took the girls all over town on Saturday and then out to eat at Applebee's. As usual, the girls were complete angels (cough, gag, blech... I hate when people call their kids that; maybe we should stick with "heathens in hibernate mode").

At the end of the meal, a woman popped her head around the divider and told my mother, You have the most well-behaved children I've ever seen! I just can't believe how good they've been. We've eaten our dinner over here and haven't heard more than a peep from across the way.

My mom, I'm sure, was proud and told her she was the grandma. In the lady's defense, my mom looks a very young 51.

I asked Mom if she replied, It's because my daughter beats them into submission.

So I must be doing something right. Damned if I'd know what it was...

It's after 1 AM. Maybe I could think it out over some quilting.

This is the last of the sickness crap, I swear

I panicked at 2:30 this afternoon. I had taken a nap and awoken to realize I couldn't talk. I could barely swallow my own spit. Note to self: check Mike's work bag for a voodoo doll, most likely burned or taped across the mouth.

I knew I had to go to the doctor at that moment. I can hear you thinking, Wha??? To the doctor so soon? Trust me, it was a shock here as well.

Unfortunately, the only thing open on a Saturday afternoon is the walk-in clinic. Have you ever been to one of these places? I jokingly asked the nurse at the desk - after registering using a combination of sign language, caveman grunts and written notes - if I should wash the pen off. She laughed like I just made the funniest joke ever. It was then I heard the boy barking like a seal in one corner of the waiting room as a sickly little girl ran around playing tag using her snot-covered hand to touch all the chairs.

One little girl (of a hoard of children) kept climbing onto my lap and I kept politely pulling away. I couldn't talk. Finally, I eeked out these words to her mother, She doesn't want what I've got. The mom laughed and turned away to tell another patient they didn't have a doctor. They just use urgent care whenever someone needs to see one. Three of her kids had suspected pneumonia.

Mmmm... I think I get the joke now. Urgent care = cesspool. I have a new respect for family physicians and urgent care doctors and their staff.

Forty-five minutes into my wait, the office "closed." At that point, the hard-nosed receptionist walked past all 30 of us to turn off the TV. What's worse is that the channel we had been watching was the hospital's channel where they advertise the different rooms and services they offer, and I was really getting into it. Bitch. The guy next to me expressed the same sentiment.

Two hours later...

The nurse pulled me into the exam room, also known as the "smaller waiting room," and asked what I was in for. I suggested politely that she swab my throat for strep.

Ten minutes later...

The doctor walked in the room and looked at my tonsils, then the positive strep result.

Thirty seconds later (I wish I was making this up - over 2 hours of waiting for a 60 second doctor visit)...

The doctor scribbled out two prescriptions - one to heal the strep and another to prevent my blowhole from swelling shut. She said it would explain why I couldn't talk or swallow. Jackpot. Mystery solved.

Five minutes later...

Target became my germ receptacle while I waited for my drugs.

Except now I think I'm high. I've had too much caffeine or a weird drug interaction, but I suddenly got the urge to quilt. For three hours.

Also, with all this new found health and energy, I thought I'd share a pie chart to reflect how I spend my time.

I'm done talking about being sick. It's so boring. I'll go back to talking about random kid shenanigans or body hair tomorrow. I promise.

Swing batta batta batta SuhWIIIING, awwww......

My mother has taken to reading my blog aloud to my father, so I figure it's about time I revisit my sex life. Yes? Alright.

The other night, out of the blue, Mike decided to put the moves on me. And I was "receptive." It had been a loooong drought.

Unfortunately, I was also "asleep" at the time, and we didn't even make it to second base. I was beyond asleep... sleeptalking and playing along. Apparently I play hard to get, though, and Mike didn't know I was sleeping, so I woke up echoing my last sentence over and over, Don't do that... Don't do that? Wait... wait... what happened? as Mike rolled away from me.

Whoops. I'm evidently a great actress, too.

In my defense, I tell him all the time that he needs to make sure I'm awake. It's not fair to hold me accountable for my sleeptalking/etc behavior.*

I considered trying to make amends right then and there, but I was tired, so I said screw it and rolled back to the other side. The best part is that I'd shaved above the knee that night.

(Okay women, tell me if you've ever gotten to that "place" in your life where you start shaving only to the knee. And if you go over the knee, it's a good day. Then you do the maintenance upper leg thatching once or twice a month. I'm kinda there.)

Okay, now it's time for something cutesy for my parents. Look! Children being odd!

Baseball could be reinvented if we only made every player wear a boxing glove.

*Someone sent me this site: Sleep Talkin' Man - a wife records and blogs what her husband says in his sleep. Hilarious! I was telling Mike about the crap he was saying and how weird it gets. That's when he said, I know. That's what you sound like. I think he's bitter...

Liar liar semi on fire

If my children remember anything about the last ten minutes, they're going to be supremely disappointed in the morning.

I had to liven them up enough to give them their Pepto-pink, freezing cold semi-liquid antibiotic. And who doesn't like having squishy raspberry-ish medicine syringed into their mouth in the dead of the night?

They got progressively less cooperative, and I had to become progressively more creative - also known as lying.

Wake up, Emma... time for your medicine. Want your ears to feel better? You've gotta drink this.

C'mon, Alison, wake up. I have a candy surprise for you. You have to drink it through this magical plastic straw.

Kristin, please sit up. No, please! SIT. UP. Hey, Kristin... Santa came! And he brought you a special treat! Here, drink this special candy drink he made for you.

They are taking that medicine, no matter how many lies I have to tell and who I have to sell my soul to. I don't care if I have to dump all three vats of pink nauseatingness into a tub and make them swim in it.

Not only has the last week been filled with crying, but on our journey to the doctor today, we encountered no less than THREE car accidents in a four-mile stretch of interstate: a 4-car pileup, a single idiot crash, and a semi rollover into oncoming traffic.

(Is it Drive Like an A-hole Day today? Did I miss the memo?)

My 20-minute head start to our appointment turned into a 15-minute defecit. I always have some crazy thing happen on my way to their office. If I were them, I'd totally think I was lying.

Totally.

And with my track record with fibbing tonight, the odds would be in their favor.

Next time I'm late, I'm gonna spice things up a bit. Yeah, sorry I'm late. A giant plastic dinosaur landed on top of my car when the space carnival passed over our house. I had to hire a pack of wild donkeys to bring us here, but we finally made it.

If they're gonna think I'm lying, we may as well be entertained.

Can YOUR kids bleed dairy products? Mine can.

Emma drew me a picture of the spaceship that I pray would swoop down and steal me away from this germ-infested hell hole. So sweet of her!

I'm not sick - YET - but give it time. I'm sure I'm only hours away from being feverish and irritable. Or from having my brains devoured by the team of zombies residing on my couch.

When Emma is sick, I liken her to me - every morning before I have caffeine.

Spot on impression, Emma!

Before you all turn into my mother and make me drag the kids in to the ER, we have an appointment tomorrow at their ped's office. My only other option was to take them to the walk-in clinic and let them wander for 90 minutes, contaminating the entire office with zombie germs. Oh yeah, not to mention pick up every other disease that's been there within the last week.

No thanks.

I hate to see the kids this sick. And hear them. Because they go neither gently nor quietly into any good night. And I don't blame them. Emma had a fever of 104.6 yesterday, and I almost had a heart attack when the thermometer read 106.4 this afternoon. (Turns out I didn't have the thermometer in correctly. I hope. I triple checked her ears and got 102s.)

I also made the mistake of using Mike's pinpoint flashlight to peek in their ears. Let's just say that if I ever ate cottage cheese before, I never would again. And you should be thankful that I didn't take pictures.

And - just in the nick of time - our insurance coverage has been corrected.

Hallelujah.

I've gotta hurry in before they randomly cancel coverage again. Or these kids spontaneously combust.

"Good morning" = false advertising

Was it Paul Revere that lit the lanterns for "one if by land, two if by sea"?

I ask because I now get most of my historical education from movies like National Treasure, and I'm not sure how seriously I can take myself when I'm quoting Nicolas Cage.

Regardless, when Mike comes home to our deck light beacon, he knows the kids have snuck out of bed in the late morning hours and are passed out on the couch. I'm not sure why they turn on that light, but they do it every single time.

Last night was one of those nights.

I fell asleep somewhere around 11:15 (or 30 minutes into Monty Python), and woke with a jolt at 2. After an hour of wandering around wondering, Why am I awake again? Alison begged to sleep in bed with us which I happily obliged - it meant I no longer had to go to her room to check her temp.

Some time after, I got up for a glass of water and saw - out of the corner of my sleepy eye - the deck light was turned on. Confused, I headed over to turn it off.

It was then I remembered Mike's comment: I always know when they're sleeping in the livingroom because that light is turned on.

Sure enough. In the dark I could discern two little lumps of baby passed out on the couch, their feet planted in each others' faces. (Normally, stink foot might have made me pull them apart for their own sake, but last night, I had the worst end of the deal with Alison's dragon breath being blown into my face.)

As Mike was sleeping peacefully well into the morning, I nudged him when it was time to get up. He moaned and groaned and acted like he had such a rough night.

Don't even start with me, I warned him.

Because anything goes, as long as you give plenty of notice.

Titillating Tuesday: The plague edition

Turns out Emma is sick. 104.3 degrees. Woohoo! Can you hear us whizzing down the highway to the ER tonight?

As a bonus, Alison now has a rash on her face. Mike swears it's the result of snotcicles, but I'm suspiciously eyeing it up as chicken pox. (Please, oh please, oh PLEASE be chicken pox. My kids are not getting the vaccine, so PLEASE let this be it.)

Anyone wanna bring their children over to rub up against my kids' spotty rashes?

---

And because things just keep getting better and better, I was going through my mail and came across a letter from our insurance company: Loren, Alison, Emma and Kristin no longer have coverage as of January 1st simply because we can do whatever we want and you have to bend over and take it. That might not be a direct quote...

So I called the insurance people. Then I called the HR people. And the HR people put me on hold while they chewed out the insurance company for the massive fuckup. Then the lovely HR people apologized as they explained what a raw arse I'm gonna have from paying out of pocket (then submitting the claim ourselves) if any of us get sick over the next 5 days. Please see above.

---

On a completely separate note, I cancelled today's lesson with my piano student. (She is not only happy and excited everyday to be here, but she stays an extra half hour to entertain the children with her new piano skills. SCORE.) So I was disappointed. But it was all for the best, since with the girls' illnesses, they also acquired a reeking case of dragon breath - way worse than any kind of morning breath you've ever encountered.

There isn't enough Febreze and Lysol in the world...

---

As a reward for thus far surviving 1300s Europe, I bought Mike and I some presents: a Monty Python movie, Game Change - a book about the 2008 campaign (for me), and a Star Wars book (soooo obviously not for me).

Instead of using any of those tonight, we will most likely end up in a daze, watching the Olympics and occasionally livening up to make fun of the ice skating outfits and snowboarders' hair.

---

Happy Plaguesday, everyone!

It's a bird, it's a plane, it's a striped turd with wings

I heard it's some kind of holiday today?

I wouldn't know.

I've been divvying my time between crying children - crying because they're sick and have ear aches, or because they're afraid of our ninja cat.

Here's Ninja Cat eyeing up Alison from across the table as she eats and colors.

The kids certainly don't let sickness slow down their creativity. Emma drew a small flying striped creature, smiley face and all, and announced its creation proudly for everyone to hear. Look at my BIRD!

Art is exhausting, though. She ended up passed out on the couch within the hour. (It might have had something to do with the drugs I've got her hopped up on.)

We discovered that when sick children laugh, they're only half of a second away from a mood shift taking them from happy to dejected and in tears. We subsequently decided that a drug-induced malaise was better than emotionally unstable children.

Also? Candy. Candy for everyone. I don't care where you eat it, as long as you stop crying about your ear hurting. Because, Sweet Baby Jesus, I can't stand to hear the crying anymore.

I need to get the hell outta here.

Driving Miss Mikey

Me: Check out that license plate over there: RUFLOSSN. Are you flossin'? Oh yeah, he really be pimpin' that minivan. He be flossin' fo sho.

Long pause...

Mike: He's probably a dentist.

---

Mike: I busted the clip off the back wiper that holds the fluid line, but I don't think that should matter much.

Me: Well, I'm pressing the "wash" button right now and no washer fluid is coming out. Maybe it's just frozen over.

Mike: Or maybe I did bust it and you're pissing washer fluid all over the car behind us.

---

Mike: You're doing 80?

Me: Maybe... why don't you just take a nap. I'm trying to travel back in time.

Mike: How long should it take to get to Milwaukee from here?

Me: Eh, probably an hour. From here it takes a little less than an hour.

Mike: It's what? 90 miles? You're not gonna get there in an hour.

Me: We might if you take a nap...

---

Mike slaps me.

Me: Hey! What was that for?

Mike: It's a new game I invented, like Punch Buggy... I call it Slap Smart. Every time I see a Smart Car, I get to slap you.

Me: Well that doesn't sound like fun.

Mike slaps me again.

Mike: Smart Car silver, no slapbacks.

---

Mike: (reading off a bumper sticker) W '04. What person thought that was a good slogan?

Me: Check out their Jesus fish. I want one but I want a Darwin fish eating a Jesus fish for my car. That'd really piss off some of our neighbors.

Mike: It's probably too late for that.

Me: You're probably right.

---

Me: Don't "back seat drivers" traditionally sit in the "back seat"?

---

I don't get paid enough for this job. Love you anyway, turd nugget.

She's got skills

Mike and I will soon be revisiting the painful experience I like to call: Trying not to kill a spouse while writing his resume.

(Resume writing is one of my many, many, manymanymanyMANY talents.)

I have had jobs across the spectrum, and while I gained skills at all of them, I'm pretty sure my unabridged resume would be a giant clump of career crap.

Here's a taste of the places I've worked:

• Movie theater
• High-end jewelry stores (three of them)
• Low-end jewelry stores (two of them)
• Parks departments (two)
• Golf course
• Target
• Tax software developer
• Glass claims auditor
• Independent graphic design
• Construction company

Oh, the places I've gone! Oops, I forgot:

• Small business owner
• Stay-at-home Nazi

In the last fifteen years, I've learned:

- why a person should never eat the popcorn at a matinee showing

- why a side window will bust easily into square bits when someone breaks in to steal your stereo

- how to use rapport to manipulate customers into proposing on-the-spot to their girlfriends

- that if you hit a small dead pine tree with a Mule, it'll pop out of the ground

I also know that some of the worst tippers are the old wealthy men at golf courses. Oh, I can keep the quarter after you made me run back to the clubhouse for a certain kind of beer and then ogled my breasts for three minutes? Why, thank you!

I wonder what kind of career those skills could be used for...

I am so totally screwed in finding gainful employment, aren't I?

Oh, and don't forgot all the fun things I've learned from staying home with my three hell-raisers. I'm guessing this is the reason some stay-at-home parents keep breeding... there is no job in the world that can use or understand the wide range of skills brought on by full-time, extreme parenting.

After having the girls in the NICU for what seemed like forever, I also have some pretty useful knowledge on handling sickness in children.

Unfortunately, I'm using that knowledge tonight.

Mike was playing Wolfenstein in the livingroom, and it took me five minutes to realize that Darth Vadar noise was coming from Emma, not the TV. I whipped out my trusty stethoscope and found the source: her upper left lung. (The lining of her lung sounds slightly inflamed, so we're waiting it out to see if it subsides or if she needs steroids.)

Jack of all trades, master of none. That's me.

Today was a day

First there was the SNOW. Inordinate amounts of the white crap filtering down from the sky. Mike went out with his shovel and beat back a few inches of it, even though within the hour the entire drive and walkway were coated.

Eventually he threw on snowpants and played outside with the girls, first building a curved wall of snow (also known as the world's most pathetically useless fort) and then a small tunnel. After a while, I saw pink coats flying past the window on sleds when he - wrongly - thought pulling the kids around would be enjoyable. I'd like to ask him how enjoyable it was, but he fell asleep nearly three hours ago.

I smartly stayed in the house and ate fresh bread and folded laundry while he was trudging through the snow like a lumberjack.

Sucker.

At least he's got the hair for it. He looks like one of those wild children you find after they've been living in the woods for decades. And you know you've got a bad hairdo when you have to wear a hat around the house to cover it up. Mike said he wouldn't doubt if one morning he wakes up with half his head shaved (by me, of course). An idea which I immediately stored away in the back of my mind for future use.

Soon it came time for giving my weekly piano lesson to the neighbor girl. It was an half hour session, but we made up for last week's missed session by doubling up. Which is fine with me since she usually stays an hour and plays for the girls while they dance. Dance, monkeys! DANCE!

As a bonus, the bitch of a cat mauled my hand during the lesson as I tried to move her out of the livingroom. My hand and wrist look as though I fought off a werewolf. And I really hate having scars that make me look suicidal.

Then there was Alison. That girl is always catching germs. This morning, I noticed her eye had the start of a shiner. I'm talking a la mosquito allergy eye swelling. It grew puffier almost by the second, and I couldn't help but think of all the disgusting possibilities that could be in her eye causing it.

I threw some Benadryl down her gullet and prayed that it didn't swell shut. AGAIN. Then I noticed she had a fever of 102. Awesome. Beyond awesome, actually. I spent ten minutes online sorting through BS to find out that adding Tylenol to Benadryl creates Tylenol PM before throwing some more meds her way.

And out she went like a light.

As the evening wound down, we sat around like lumps of mush. We watched Biggest Loser, and for once in my life, watching fat people on treadmills didn't make me want to devour every ounce of food in my cupboards.

Yay, me.

Instead I shockingly put in a full hour of exercise. In all fairness, some of that hour was spent blowing up the exercise ball. I count that as lung exercise, though. Puff puff pass..... but there was no one to pass to so I just kept on puffing.

I have too much crap to do tomorrow to stay up any later than I have already. I'm so exhausted there shouldn't be any dreams.

Also: yay, me.

Titillating Tuesday: Mr Ghost Man says hello

What do you do when a friendly neighbor drives by, smiles and waves?

Throw snow at them! Duh.

As soon as I saw Casey coming down the street, I knew Alison was going to give him her standard greeting of chucking fistfuls of snow at his car. (He always laughs and keeps driving.)

He thinks it's funny now, but wait until Spring when there are rocks readily available.

Yeah... we're gonna be dealing with this while it's still harmless snow.

---

Speaking of snow, we had a snow day today!

We'll probably have school tomorrow in the middle of the blizzard because Iowans only drive like morons at the first onset of snow, or sometimes just the thought of snow.

Snow??? Wha?!? Starting in four hours? I'd better drive 40 miles an hour down the interstate, half on the shoulder... just in case the snow flies early. Give 'em a day and they'll be doing 90 down a slush-and-snow-covered highway.

Hey, Wisconsin people (all ten dozen of you - my most loyal following, I love ya), this Scheiße's coming your way. Enjoy!

---

I might check in from time-to-time on Twitter again if Craig Ferguson takes it up. Because it's lost its luster since NPH quit posting hilarious pictures of himself.

Craig Ferguson can be my baby's daddy anyday.

---

Dear Mike: Lying down in the vicinity of the laundry pile does not get you bonus points toward getting the clothes folded, although you earned points for dumping the noodles into the boiling water. Let's call it a wash. (But I will warn you that if I find you've stolen my pillow again, you will not only be negative in the points department, but most likely have a pair of dirty socks crammed under your nose in the morning.)

---

I've been thinking about going to a movie while the girls are in school... if anything interesting is playing. Unfortunately, nothing qualifies.

When I was younger, my friends and I wanted to see mainstream movies because they were geared toward adults. They were truly badass. We would sneak into PG-13 and R movies. Now, the mainstream movies are geared toward 13-year-old girls and the adults are clamouring to see them.

Am I the only grown woman who could do without the Zac Efrons in the world? I feel like I'm at a perpetual roller-rink party where they play only Avril Lavigne and Taylor Swift songs, and everyone's dressed like emo-posers, talking about how they've contemplated swallowing a bottle of pain pills because their iPhone isn't compatible with the latest T-Pain app. It's my own personal hell.

Bring me something other than Disney, made-for-TV after school specials. I'm not a teenager anymore, so let's skip the forced teenage angst.

Time to step off the soapbox...

---

For a change of pace, my ghost friend made another appearance tonight - about 30 seconds ago when I got up to check on a coughing child.

Nothing like seeing the upper-half of a man gliding across the hallway to give your heart a jumpstart.

(He's still in that same white shirt. Maybe I should offer to wash it for him. I'm doing laundry right now, after all, it's only polite. Mmmm... shirtless ghost man. It's almost too much too handle.)

Maybe I should ask him to put a bell around his neck like I do with the cat so he can't sneak up on me.

---

It was an exhausting day... in a good way.

We drew pictures, ate snacks, watched movies, read books, sang songs, played with toys together, and when I couldn't stand them anymore, I threw them outside in the blizzard to play.

Have fun, girls! Give a holler if you get stuck or lose feeling in your extremities.

Emma spent ten minutes packing her red bucket full of snow. I watched her turn it over and look at it triumphantly as she unveiled the "snow castle" underneath.

She smiled at it for a second... just before she karate chopped it into oblivion.

My little mini-Chuck-Norris-me makes me so proud.

---

Have a lovely Tuesday!

Getting old, feeling older

Remember back in your 20s when you could measure how much fun you had at a party by the number of pictures that your friends took of you doing something inappropriate to inanimate objects, yet you couldn't remember at what point you got friendly with the floor lamp?

We are entering the 30s, folks.

I can now measure how much fun I've had by how many body parts are immobile or in excruciating pain the next day.

And boy, did we have fun this weekend, as is evidenced by my neck alternating between being paralyzed in the upright position and the bearer of the kind of pain only a night of wild hair swinging can bring.

A bunch of us got together for my cousin's birthday in Milwaukee and to watch her husband's band play (yes, again). Here they are, one last time with Jeff - the guitarist in the back left - before he leaves the band.

For the first few hours, it was a private party, so Mike and the kids were there to eat food, mingle and smack the dart board buttons a few thousand times. At first I felt a twinge of guilt that Mike was up in the balcony watching the kids, but then he confessed that he could hear all the conversations happening below, which I'm guessing made for an entertaining evening. Guilt alleviated!

As Mike was being the proverbial fly on the wall, I was getting a lot of, Your girls are dolls! To my surprise, I was also getting quite a few hugs and kisses from people I only know through my cousin. My "drunk buddy" Katie aside, I was surprised to hear a lot of, You are so much fun... I love when you visit! from random people I couldn't name or pick out in a lineup.

While it might seem to be an ego boost, the more I heard it, the more worried and defensive I became. I am not fun! I huffed defiantly in my head. At one point, I was watching the band and drinking a beer when a new acquaintance said, You are so GOOD! I wondered what I was so GOOD at - standing, maybe? Drinking beer? Why, thank you! I do love my beer, and standing is my favorite... She was quite nice, but I was still worried.

I've cracked the code. I smile too much. (Which brings me to my next project: I need to work on brooding - maybe turn a bit more emo.)

We weren't the only "fun" ones at the party. Crazy Drunk Angry Guy came, too, thank goodness. What party is complete without Crazy Drunk Angry Guy?

'Roid Rager's friends had to talk him down from beating the lead singer's face back to the Stone Age. No one has any idea why, but I'm guessing Drew had seen Crazy Drunk Angry Guy's sister in an unladylike way. Just a guess.

Then there were the decorations and the misuse thereof. Brent's latest Girl Scout badge, earned for a night of Wii mastery coupled with singing Black Eyed Peas' I've Got a Feeling over 40 times, was displayed prominently on his chest for all to see.

The real kicker of this weekend is that I drank enough Budweiser and 7&7s to kill a small rhinocerus and somehow ended up without a hangover. That would be a win if I didn't have to walk around as if I was locked into an invisible neck brace.

Damn, this getting older thing really sucks. But not for you, Erin! Enjoy 30, and I'll see you there soon.

Vacations - why are they fun again?

Happy Friday!

I'm hurriedly typing this because I need to get dressed and packed for our trip this weekend and Mike is going to be back any second to boot me off the computer so he can check his virtual fishtanks on Facebook.

I hate packing.

I've always been a procrastinator, so it always comes down to what's clean in my closet 30 minutes before I leave.

Thankfully, I spent last night watching Craig Ferguson and doing laundry. I didn't fold much of it, though - a cardinal sin! - so I'm gonna be digging like a gopher through the mounds of clothing in my livingroom, searching for lost socks and coordinating pants and shirts.

Uh, oh, the master cometh.

Have an awesome weekend!

When whispering is too loud

After all this talk about what a great mom I am, I was dangerously close tonight to yelling at the girls, Please just SHUT UP!!!!

Close, but I suppressed it.

I'm in the midst of one of the worst migraines* I've ever had. (Thanks, Dad, for that wonderful genetic hand-me-down.) It began yesterday morning.

I started getting them a few years ago, one of my first while I was pregnant and was in the ER after 4-ish days of crying in a dark room with a cold, wet cloth on my head. Pain like you could never imagine. I was certain it was an aneurysm or a small mammal that had taken hold in my skull.

Thankfully I've learned little tricks since then.

Silence.

Dim lighting.

Aspirin.

Or when you're out on the town with three noisy children, you can settle for Keep it down back there before mommy's head blows up, driving with one eye open, and a can of Mountain Dew.

That was my evening. That, and wishing that a doctor would randomly find me on the street, tell me there was only one cure, and that it was to drill a hole in my skull to release the demons causing the pain. Because I'm sure I could have scrounged up a cordless screwdriver somewhere.

(I actually remember reading somewhere that that's how Jesus converted all those sick people... a drill and a little wine. Because I'm pretty sure I would have signed up for any religion that made the brain-swelling horror stop.)

Migraines* definitely put a damper on all these activities I had planned.

But homework must go on.

And oh, did the children have homework. Do you ever wonder how long it takes a 5-year-old to color an eight-page workbook? Because I know.

Forty minutes.

It's not that peaceful kind of forty minute coloring, either.

It's the: come look what I just colored pink and what color should the eyes be and just loooooook at it, mommy! coloring. Take a completely tranquil setting and then imagine the polar-fucking-opposite of that.

Whoops. That one got away from me there for a second.

I'm gonna take my Mommy of the Year award and crawl into a quiet, dark corner to die for a while...

*I, in fact, do not get migraines. What I get are called cluster headaches, one of the most excruciating forms of pain known to the human body. They are also known as "suicide headaches." My father has sought treatment for them for 30+ years, so I knew what I was having but after all these years I never knew that they were not a form of a migraine. My mistake, I learned something new today. Yay, me!

My redemption

What kind of mom am I? You might ask. I wouldn't blame you, what with all the midget and CPS jokes, it's kind of expected.

Well...

I am the type of mom who throws her kids outside to play, then tells them they can pull the broken sticks out of my garden to poke in the snow.

I am the type of mom who makes rootbeer floats for her kids... just because.

I am the type of mom who makes suppers like tonight's orange-mustard glazed salmon and shrimp over rice with mini corn cobs, even though I was so tired I could have fallen asleep standing up.

I am the type of mom who reads Olive, the Reindeer to her kids half a dozen times every day.

I am the type of mom who carries her kids whenever they ask because you never know when they'll be too big to pick up.

I am the type of mom who practices the girls' phonics songs with them in the car.

I am the type of mom who curls up in bed with them to watch a movie.

I am the type of mom who loves her girls very much, even after they destroy half of my worldly possessions.

I am the type of mom who knows I only have one chance to do this right.

But on a more serious note... I am also the type of mom who lets her kids watch the occasional Family Guy. Because they think talking dogs are funny.

And, frankly, so do I.

Titillating Tuesday: Call me when it's Spring

Groundhog's Day. Trash Day. The first one taunts me with the possibility of an early Spring, only to disappoint nearly every year. The second forces me to drag my tired ass out of bed in the freezing cold to hoist garbage out to the curb.

I'm not sure I want to celebrate either of them.

---

I want to see Wolfman. Partly because every other woman will be dragging her spouse to see Valentine's Day, leaving the other movies empty all weekend. And also because I've had inappropriate thoughts about Sir Anthony Hopkins since Silence of the Lambs.

---

I was thinking tonight how funny it is that I've never seen that second Twilight series movie. I have also never been inside a Hooters. Guess which one of those I'm aiming to check off my list this month.

It's simply a smart career exercise. I'm scoping out job opportunities.

---

The kids are in this new phase of raising their hands, shooting rapid-fire commentary at me like shoes at a George W press conference.

So... I have a question? My doggy if the wolf bites his butt, he'll get a band-aid, and then I'll go trick-or-treating and get a lollipop.

So... I have a question? I played with Lucas and then he stole my icicles and broke them and that was naughty.

So... I have a question? Emma is a tooty-butt.

Don't let them fool you. It's almost never a question.

---

So... I have a question? I spotted tonight. And then Bald / Plaid Gary announced he and his wife are expecting again. And I freaked out and went digging for a pee stick. Then I remembered I haven't had sex for something just shy of a year.

Phew. Close call.

But totally congrats to you guys, Gary! Train those first three to warm bottles and you're golden.

---

I walked into the bathroom a few days ago and found that the girls had filled my brand new jar of Nad's (expensive hair remover) with water, completely ruining it. I was pissed.

Cut to tonight. I opened the cabinet and saw my Nad's container - completely untouched.

I had dreamed the entire thing just that convincingly.

Reason #392 why I sometimes wake Mike up and ask him if the house is on fire / there are spiders on the ceiling / he tried to get frisky with me.

Because I can't tell the difference between dream and reality.

---

At what point should a person stop snacking and eat a regular meal? Perhaps after 6 Clementines? Mmmm... Clementines. Maybe I should have one more and call it quits. Seven is a nice pretty number.

Oranges are healthy... right?

---

I'm reading this awesome non-fictional book about Captain Kidd. I knew it was the book for me when it opened with the crude examination of a pirate's penis. Yowza.

PS The next few pages talk about bribery and prostitutes. It's as if this book was written for me.

---

I just realized my cousin's party is the weekend of the SuperBowl. ERGGGG. We'll have the kids with us, so maybe we'll drive as far as we can get and then stop at a bar to watch the game?

That's not bad parenting. It's exposure to new and different cultures.

At least that's what I'll tell the government folks when they knock on my door.

---

In case you're wondering, this 7th Clementine is delicious. Perhaps the best out of all the ones I've eaten tonight.

---

Happy Tuesday, everyone! Don't forget to watch that asshole groundhog see his shadow today.

Bring on more winter!!!