potato chips

I took a crack at ho-made potato chips last night and loved them. Why the hell haven't I tried this before? I can make 'em how I like 'em. Thick.

Everybody loved them. I swore to myself I wouldn't ever buy potato chips from the store again.

When I woke up this morning my kitchen smelled like a shitty greasy spoon. The overwhelming smell of used oil was a little too much to take at the ass crack of dawn when all I really wanted was a cup of coffee.

I pulled out the seven scented candles I have leftover from wedding presents and lit up the house. The floral smell was enough to choke a donkey but still better than old oil.

After a little research I found I could have just poured a bowl of vinegar and left it out. Within a couple of hours the vinegar smell dissipates and it takes the crap smells with it. That would have been a lot more pleasant for everyone else when they rolled out of bed.

taxes take two

We have officially had our taxes rejected. We knew it was coming but it still sucks.

Our next step was to file them again in paper form. We know they will be rejected again but the accountant says mailing in a paper copy fulfills our April 15th deadline obligation since this is likely to drag out way past April 15.

And back to the waiting game...

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

We have another meeting with the family therapist on Monday. I've started to question myself if we're doing the right thing bringing him. Why do I have any kind of expectation that this lady can help? Why do I think she can gain a level of Alex's trust that I don't have.

I used to feel like the stability Dave and I have here made up for the anarchy with the ED. Lately it feels like we're slowly slipping and all the hugs and kisses we give aren't enough.

I need more friends

Last night my sister invited me to go to a party with her in a little over a week.

Its at a professional photographers house... complete with wine and cheese and other fancy shit.

Real non-coworker adults to be around.

I'm already counting down the days and trying to figure out what I want to wear.

I think I need more friends.

pound the crazy out.

The foot doc must think I'm insane. He told me exactly what I expected to hear and I still burst into tears...

I quit wearing the fugly boot about a week ago. I hit the limit of my tolerance and couldn't bring myself to put it back on. I went the 6 weeks required so I didn't feel all that bad about it or feel like I was jeopardizing my foot's ability to heal.

To look like a good little patient, I slipped the boot on right before my appointment and walked in.

Unfortunately for him I was already uptight and ready to snap when he came in.

doc: "Lets go ahead and wean you out of the boot, here's a schedule to follow..."

uh yeah

doc: "how does it feel?"

me: "I don't know. Its sore but there's so much going on down there I can't pinpoint anything"

doc: "I don't feel any catch in the joint movement. I only want you to wear stable shoes and I want to see you back here in 4 weeks. Its going to be sore. Sore at night, sore walking, sore in the morning. It wont be normal when you come back in 4 weeks, but it might be better 4 to 6 weeks after our next visit"

and here is where I turn on the waterworks...

I *should* be happy, but you know something? IT STILL SUCKS. By the time I might be normal it will have been 18 months since this shit started, over a year since I last ran, and I NEED that outlet. I need to turn on my iPod, shut out the world and go pound pavement until I don't have the energy to be uptight, worried, or just generally crazy.

I know its not the foot doc's fault and I shouldn't direct my frustration in his general direction. He really is trying to fix me and get me back to running. He's just an easy target, especially when the bills for this latest surgery have started to roll in and the total from the very beginning to now is almost $20,000.

That is one really expensive fucking toe.

a punching bag could come in handy

I had one of those mornings. You know the kind... if it wasn't for love your husband and kids would probably be buried in a field somewhere.

It was a normal Sunday morning getting ready for church. Dave was still sleeping and the kids and I were pretty laid back until the last 10 minutes then its balls to the wall trying to get everyone into their coats and strapped in the car and hope like hell we wont be late.

We walk in right as they start singing the entrance song and its a race for us to get into our pew and shake our coats off before the priest starts talking.

The kids pull the kneeler down and that's when the trouble started. Olivia absolutely HAD to touch Alex. It didnt matter how she touched him, she just had to keep some part of her touching anything on him.

I gave it 30 seconds before I put Olivia on the other side of me. I then spent the next hour dragging her ass back to her side of me. If I tried paying any attention to mass, she would shoot behind me to get to him. I would pull her back, she would jerk to get down and start crying.

I know they have a cry room in the back of the church for just this kind of situation but I've made it 4 years without the kids learning what that room really is for and I am sure as shit not going to teach them they get a free pass by turning into a banshee.

So there we sit, feeling like a spectacle. I can feel all of the old ladies sitting behind me trying to kill me with their eyes.

The process of getting up, gathering all of our crap and shoving the kids out the door would have outed myself as the source of the disturbances to the entire church.

When Olivia decided to scream/cry into my shoulder through the ENTIRE consecration I thought my head would pop off.

Church finally ends and I get the kids coats on as fast as I can trying hard not to make eye contact with anyone afraid I would get some sympathetic soul try to make me feel better and I would have to sit smile and nod when really I would rather just punch them in the face.

When Dave gets up 3 hours later he asks me how church went. I said it was bad. Really bad.

Dave: "Lots of wiggling?"
me: "yes"
Dave: "Lots of screwing around?"
me: "yes"
Dave: "wow, you're still pissed. What exactly did Alex do?"
me: "Alex was perfect, it was your darling daughter."

The look of disbelief I got from my husband was enough to want to punch him too.

valentines

Not a single snowflake yet and schools have been canceled.

WTF.

Don't they realize I tortured Alex last night doing everything I could short of duct taping his ass to his chair so he would finally finish writing his name on the 30 valentines we had to make for preschool?

Preschool valentines suck. When I was in school it was a simple perforated card with some cute little kitten with a heart that said "Be Mine" and maybe a heart candy or two taped to the card. Now its a competition between the Alpha-Moms to make the best valentine PACKAGE. Seriously? A package? We don't need any more decorative pencils, shitty heart erasers, cheap little necklaces or bracelets, and stickers. You wanna put something in there I do need?

CHOCOLATE people.

I can talk myself out of buying it, but when its given to us its easy to collect it all, stick it in the cookie jar and strap the jar to my face like a feed bag when the kids aren't looking cuz its not fair to eat it in front of them ya know.

Back to the fucking valentines... The number of valentines we needed to make is bullshit. Screw the fact that his class has a total of 11 kids. The teacher wants to spread the love and have every kid give a valentine to all other kids regardless of whether they are in the morning or afternoon class or going on M/W/F or Tu/Th.

I couldn't control my competitive side and I joined in the race for the best valentine package with the other alpha-moms. I went all Martha Stewart and crammed heart shaped straws, stickers, chocolate, and all 30 Iron Man valentines Alex labored over into cute little plastic bags tied closed with red ribbons.

I should be ashamed of myself but I'll probably hold in my feelings of regret until I scour his valentines next week looking for a package that's better than mine. Uh, his.

Death of the magazine

Dave got me an iPod for Christmas. A super cute little silver nano that I loved.

Then he borrowed it when he went to a conference and decided he loved it more than me and wouldn't give it back.

He started feeling pretty guilty and that guilt worked in my favor. He came home with an iPod touch.

It is the coolest gadget. ever.

The commercials wern't kidding, this thing can do anything.

I think I'd like to read a book... There's an app for that.
I wonder what the weather is like on the other side of the country? There's an app for that.
Would I like to track my menstrual cycle? Yes, they have an app for that too.

A few nights ago I was getting ready for bed and playing with my iPod. Standing in the bathroom brushing my teeth, and washing my face, while checking email and updating my status on Facebook. Sit down for one last pee before bed and wander over to the YouTube app. Full access to YouTube conveniently organized to bring me straight to the top 25 most viewed videos and an enormous list of videos they're featuring that day.

Thanks to my iPod and YouTube, what should have taken me approximately 20 seconds to accomplish lasted long enough to make my legs go numb and make a ring indent around my ass.

I will never have a need for a magazine in the bathroom again.

ewwww

My company has decided to move my desk to a new floor. I figured I could shed some weight and throw out anything that has dust on it.

Holy crap. My desk may looked relatively empty but apparently, it wasn't.

I have found:

• Boy Scout popcorn expired 04/02
• Easy Mac & Cheese expired 01/19/05
• Policeman Pez dispenser that I haven't seen in about 5 years with one pez candy left in it
  
• Sleeve of crackers from when I was pregnant 3 years ago
• Generic ibuprofen bottle filled with what I can only assume is Vicodin
• Comet cleaner - why in the hell would I have Comet at work?
• My pink fuzzy gloves I thought I lost last winter
• A picture of me, drunk, trying to climb a palm tree in Nogales Mexico while on a business trip to Phoenix
• a pile of floppy disks that probably outweighs me
• old-timey picture of some unknown family from the Nebraska Historical Society. Looks like they wanted the whole family so they included two horses and the cow that's standing on the roof

*shudder*