Breaking Up With Facebook

It was approximately 3.5 years ago that I committed to what would become my most solid Internet marriage, Facebook. I had previously had a short engagement with his sluttier cousin, MySpace, but our relationship soured when I announced that I was on my way to the hospital TO GIVE BIRTH TO A LIVE HUMAN BEING and got nary a comment. That spelled the end for me and MySpace. It was clearly his fault.

After the “No Comment” fiasco and a few rounds of postpartum narcotics, I was ready to enter into a new relationship.

Enter Facebook.

At first we stumbled around like new lovers. I posted stupid updates about my boring day-to-day life and my latest trip to My Gym just because that’s what I saw other people do. Eventually we found our groove and I started posting only about the most important things in my life- my kids, reality television, and occasionally my husband- in exactly that order.

So why am I ready to break up with Facebook? Am I too busy with my new baby? Do I want to take a stand against everyone who posts political opinions? Is there too much baby mama drama showing up in my news feed? Nah. It is because Facebook makes me feel guilty!

As a child I do not ever remember being subjected to posing in a wasteland of pumpkins. Kids of my generation were just happy with the occasional Ronald McDonald sighting or a nip on a candy cigarette from time to time. We didn’t need to visit Pumpkin Paradise to get the most fabulous gourd in town- they do sell them in Publix, ya know. But dammit if my kids weren’t the only ones this year who were not photographed in matching orange shirts and blue jeans in the local neighborhood pumpkin patch!

I don’t remember agreeing to this photo session when I first filled out my Mom application… Or did I? I remember agreeing to love, snuggle, and smile at a cheery newborn. I may have agreed to help a school-aged child with her homework occasionally. I think I agreed to take a few snapshots here and there. But this new phenomenon of a mandatory photo shoot for almost every holiday is just waaaay too much for a slacker mom like me!

Also making me feel guilty are the recipes and craft projects that people pin to Pinterest that show up in my newsfeed. If you are actually making even 1/2 of what you pin, you suck. If you have the time to quilt little pink fuzzy warmers for your child’s pencil erasers, YOU HAVE TOO MUCH TIME ON YOUR HANDS! Also, you suck.

So will this guilt really be enough to make me break up with Facebook once and for all? Probably not. I will suffer in (near) silence. Just remember that every time you post a picture of your kids in matching outfits sitting atop an innocent pumpkin or pin a recipe for The Best Jalapeno Popper Dip EVERRRR, you are chipping away at a piece of my heart.

Hell ain’t got shiz on being pregnant with twins

Ha, ha- made you look! I’m not really pregnant with twins, but as I cruise into this last month of pregnancy I feel like I might as well be. Plus I thought the words shiz and twins kinda rhyme? Maybe not. I recently read that by the 3rd trimester, women are operating on only about 80% of their normal brainpower. I could be making that statistic up. I am currently lacking the brainpower to do a simple google search to try and find the article where I may or may not have read that…

So I’m 36 1/2 weeks pregnant (do not try to cheat me out of that 1/2 week, I earned it goddammit!). And although I have been saying I am 9 months pregnant for a few weeks, (close enough, right?) it is now official. Even though this is my 3rd pregnancy, I am constantly able to amaze myself with my naivety. It was only one short week ago that I was out to dinner with friends, feeling just fine. I distinctly remember thinking, “I am like a serene earth mother. I can totally handle this last month of pregnancy. It really is not as bad as everyone makes it out to be. I will be just fine, it’s not going to be as miserable as I remember it being the last two times.”

Ha, ha, ha, haaaaaaaaaaa! Just a few days later, after the torrential downpours in NE Florida were over, the heat returned. And with it came my misery. My estimate is that 84.7% of the negative things associated with the last month of pregnancy can be attributed to the temperature. Well, at least this has been my experience. All three of mine have been summer babies.

Believe it or not, I actually planned it this way. I guess because I already have a boy and a girl, sometimes people think that this was an accidental pregnancy. Clearly these are people who do not know me very well. I plan out my kids outfits a week in advance. I write things like “take vitamin” on my daily to-do list. I have a routine for doing my routines. When my husband and I moved into our house we replaced the flooring. And it is no coincidence that the hardwood and carpets very closely match the color of our dirty blonde heads (makes for much cleaner looking floors, even when they are covered in hair). People with OCD have nothing on me. Do you really think I would leave something like a human life up to chance? No way, Jose!

I think I just love to torture myself. Why would I quit when things were just starting to get easy around here? I mean, I have two kids who wake up and get their own cereal and milk out of the fridge and watch several hours a tiny bit of TV while Mommy and Daddy catch up on their beauty rest. Clearly I needed to find a way to destroy my little piece of heaven. So I planned a pregnancy that would end in late July…Please remind me not to do that again.

Crazy for Cruggers

Yesterday my husband and I celebrated seven years of constant wedded bliss marriage. A marriage that has yet to result in any 911 calls for domestic battery, no less! These seven years have included some pretty big life changes. And although we lived together prior to marriage, little did I know that Crug still had plenty of surprises in store for me after we got hitched. Seven years ago I had no idea that my husband would charm me into loving him more and more each and every day by doing the following things:

1. Loading the dishwasher. Here you may be thinking I am lucky to have a husband who even touches dirty dishes but you would be wrong. Have you ever known anyone to put pots and pans on the top rack and cups on the bottom? This is a crime on par with homicide as far as I am concerned. When I open the dishwasher after he has done his handiwork, I curse him loud enough for all the neighbors to hear silently knowing that I will have to reorganize the whole damn thing before it can be turned on. I am pretty confident that my 2-year-old could do a better job than his father when it comes to this chore.

2. Throwing empty water bottles on the floor. I guess this requires some explanation…See, before we got married, my husband’s best friend in the world was his rottweiler, Donovan (aka D-Lo). D-Lo was his partner in crime, his confidante, his everything. Apparently D-Lo enjoyed playing with empty water bottles more than just about anything and at some point it became Crug’s habit to just throw them on the floor for his buddy to play with. OK, no big deal, right? Except, wait. Donovan has been dead for almost 9 years now. But the water bottles remain. I know you miss him, Crug, but neither Dasani nor Aquafina will bring him back.

3. Putting his dirty socks away. Well, only if “putting away” can be defined as placing them on the kitchen counter. Every single day. In the same exact spot. As though the kitchen counter is the appropriate home for dirty socks, their rightful place in this world. Ladies, try not to be jelly just cause Cruggers is all mine.

As with most of my complaint lists (I am beginning to detect a trend here…) I could go on and on. And on. And on. And on. But I won’t. Sweet Crug puts up with my bananas every day and for this I am grateful. Most days he even manages to make me laugh. On good days I even still like him. Here’s to seven more, baby!

Things that bug me- Part IV

I know for a fact at least 3 of you missed me. Here we go again:

1. When people use the “reply all” function on texts/email. I have a friend who recently had a major body overhaul teensy bit of plastic surgery. After she sent a pic of her new hot bod to me and approximately 50 of her nearest and dearest, I started getting some really creepy texts from strangers. Here was the first: “You look so tiny. I can’t get over how sexy you look.” Um, thanks? And then: “OMG, I can’t wait to see your naked body in person!”  Hmm, a bit forward, no? I mean, I don’t even know you. And finally, this: “You look so hot babe. It sucks that we can’t do it for a few days. I want to dry-hump you so bad!” Just kidding about the last one, but you get the idea.

2. When people are afraid to use their horn. If I am sitting in front of you at a traffic light, checking out a lawn guy’s amazing body as he meticulously trims some bush and the light turns green, don’t expect me to notice it. But feel free to honk at me to tell me to go. And don’t take all day about it, either. The honk should occur approximately 4 seconds after the turning of the light. Any sooner than that and you are rude. Any longer than that and you are screwing up traffic patterns.

3. Hard-to-open packaging. Have you opened a child’s toy recently? Just what is so dangerous about a soft, fuzzy Elmo doll? I mean, other than the homicidal tendencies his voice tends to incite. Why must he be restrained in a cardboard box like poor Lindsay Lohan is in a courtroom?

4. The chintzy number of napkins they give you at Subway. Why do they only allot 1-2 napkins per customer? And why does every single Subway employee I have ever encountered go along with the shenanigans? Never have I ever had a sandwich artist slip me a few extra napkins without being asked. And when I do ask for more, they make me feel like I must explain the need for the additional napkins. “I’m sorry miss, but could you spare an extra napkin or two? See, I just had dental surgery and it didn’t go quite as planned. The surgery was only supposed to take an hour but it ended up lasting almost 7. True story. The oral surgeon said he had never seen anything like it. Apparently my mouth is much smaller than anyone would have ever expected. My mom said her mouth is like that, too. Maybe it’s genetic? Anyways, my lip is still kinda leaky. See, look? So could you spare another square?”

5. Mother freakin’ Zhu Zhu pets. Seriously. Enough said.

Word of the day- “Yenta Claus”

This one comes courtesy of what is possibly the most reputable source of all time, urbandictionary.com. According to Jewish folklore, Yenta Claus is: a way cool older woman that’s nice and really funny. She brings kids toys, especially us really good Jewish kids who Santa seems to forget…

Also on urbandictionary.com I discovered a letter that sweet young Jacob wrote to Santa:

“Dear Santa, do you have any magic Jewish elves to spare around Hanukkah? See my sister says you know Yenta Claus? Is there really such a person or not? Is there really a Hanukkah Harry? Who is this Santa Cohen and are any of them magic elves? Are they really Jewish too? Is Yenta Claus real? If that is true ask her not to forget me. Just say I am good and to give me an ipod. I love you, Thank you. Jacob.”

Word of the day- “formication”

Get your head out of the gutter, people.

According to thefreedictionary.com, formication is a noun which can be defined as: a body sensation that feels as if ants are crawling over the skin.

“I feel intense formication whenever I see a commercial for Dr. Phil. He really is that creepy.”

In Honor of Veteran’s Day

My favorite veteran of all time is my mother. She joined the Navy in 1973 at the ripe young age of 18, and worked as a corpsman. After having kids, she spent several years in the reserves during which time she also finished college. She was commissioned as a Naval officer in 1988.

In August of 1990 my mom, a single mother, had to leave her babies behind when she left for training in Virginia before heading to Saudi Arabia to do her part in what would become the Gulf War. I cried myself to sleep each and every night she was gone. My mom was a part of Fleet Hospital 5. And until I sat down today and actually looked it up, I had no idea how revolutionary her work in that desert truly was. Apparently, her fleet hospital was the very first that was ever mobilized and deployed. Pretty cool, huh? I don’t know a great deal about the time she spent there other than it was hot and the generators were very noisy. My mom doesn’t like to talk about it very much. Finally, after what felt like an eternity for everyone involved, she came home in February of 1991.

After returning from Desert Storm, my mom went on to get her master’s degree and become a nurse anesthetist. When she retired from the Navy in 2003, she was awarded with the Navy and Marine Corps Commendation Medal for her years of service. I love to joke about my mom being the Hurricane and all, but what she really is to me is a hero.

Fingernails and the fridge fiasco

As I was scooping my sweet toddler out of his crib after a nap the other day, I saw him pulling at a thin piece of fingernail that was dangling from the tip of his finger. Being that I am kind-hearted and all, I wanted to help him avoid a painful hangnail by picking at it. So I popped his finger into my mouth to bite off the irksome dangly fingernail…Only it wasn’t a fingernail at all. Yup! You guessed it. It was actually a booger. Have I ever mentioned how much I loveeee being a mom?!

So after I finished enjoying my booger snack, I got on the phone with Lowe’s for the 13th time this week regarding the new refrigerator I purchased. It seems that our old fridge “Freezy” decided she could no longer keep up with the amount of ice that our family demands in order to keep the frozen drinks frosty around the clock. And after a few months of buying a bag of ice on a near-daily basis, I did the math and figured out that in the long run it would end up being cheaper to spring for a new fridge. (Here you may wonder why we didn’t just buy a few ice trays and do it old-school style? I kid you not when I say that the thought never crossed my mind until my mom suggested it. Of course this was after we had already bought the new fridge.) So a week ago, we started shopping for a new fridge.

It seems I have been very naïve for the last 33 years or so. See, I stupidly assumed that a fridge is a fridge is a fridge, right? Wrong. All I wanted was a white side-by-side ice box. And one of Cruggers friends works at Lowe’s and said he had just the right fridge for us. And because of a few scratches on the side, it was marked down 1/2 price. Sold! I got the model number, did a bit of research, and then placed the order over the telephone, sight unseen. Our new beauty was to be delivered the next day.

I should have known she was trouble from the moment she came in the door. The delivery guy actually had to remove the door from the hinges to get her through. And I thought I was getting a Frigidare but what I really got was a headache. The fridge that was delivered was a Samsung. Do they even make kitchen appliances? Does it have a television built into the side or something? I don’t know. But what I do know is that we plugged in our new fridge, waited the requisite 24 hours, and opened the door with our hats and muffs on, just waiting for the arctic blast that was sure to erupt from within. But it didn’t…At all. This Samsung was filled to the top with nothing but hot air. She earned the nickname “Scam-sung” on the spot.

When I called Lowe’s, the reaction I got was basically this: It was marked down 1/2 price, what did you expect? Hmmm…Well, for almost $600 I expected a bit more than a huge empty hot box to sit in the corner of my kitchen displaying the mediocre artwork of small children. Several days later they sent a guy out to fix it. Crug laughed at me when I got a bit scared by the man who did work involving flames and black smoke on the back of the refrigerator. Apparently he was soldering some parts back together? This spooked me. I wouldn’t buy a car with random parts fired together by a man wearing an apron. And I don’t want this in my Scam-sung either! But apron-man did get Scammy running again. And I tried to get past the images in my head of fireballs shooting through the water-dispenser. I swear I did.

The next day I went to clean out ol’ Freezy in the garage.  Although Scammy was a bit larger on the outside than Freezy, she had less storage space on the inside. Kinda like a gastric bypass patient immediately after surgery. I had to throw away about 1/3 of Freezy’s contents (even sacrificing my 6-1/2-year-old wedding cake!) in order to make everything fit into Scammy. Now I was really starting to hate this Scam-sung. As I scrubbed away at Freezy to prepare her for a hot Craigslist ad, I started to realize just how beautiful she still was. Once I cleaned out all the lettuce scraps and moldy dead-vegetable liquid, she was sparkling like new. And I felt like I was breaking up with her because my parents forced me to or something. I just didn’t want to let her go. So I was feeling all bummy and decided to go inside to get a water and reflect on my relationship with sweet Freezy. I sadly brought my cup over to Scammy for a fill of ice, and…what? No ice?!

It seems the sluggish icemaker situation is being caused by some drama going on with the filtered water outlet. Freezy was never to blame in the first place! Giddy does not begin to describe my mood. I was still within my 7 day return period on the Scam-sung so I could kick her to the curb, no questions asked. Best of all, I wouldn’t have to leave my sweetie, after all. Freezy stays. Peace out, Scammy!

Word of the day Wednesday- “vomitory”

According to merriam-webster.com, vomitory is a noun which can be defined as: an entrance piercing the banks of seats of a theater, amphitheater, or stadium.

“I cannot wait to get through the vomitory. I am just dying to see the new Pauly Shore movie!”

Things that bug me- Part III

Here we go again. And if you never did before, please be sure to check out Thing 1 and Thing 2. And without further adieu:

1. Kids with mohawks. I know that many, many people disagree with me and think that kids with mohawks are bad ass. And I get it. Clearly the parents of these kids are very cool punk rocker types. That’s rad, seriously. But why must they take this out on their innocent children? I mean, I used to be am obsessed with NKOTB. But that doesn’t mean I would put my child through the social stigma associated with having a receding hairline similar to that of Donnie Wahlberg. Can you imagine the stares I might get at Target if I shaved my boy’s head only at the temples? This would likely incur more harsh looks than the ones directed at mom’s who tote their kids around on leashes. But I don’t have a problem with fauxhawks at all. In fact, on a DILF like David Beckham, it is downright hot.

2. A bad signal on a cell phone. I’m guessing this shouldn’t bug me nearly as much as it does, but it really makes me angry. Me: “Hey, Jenny H!” Jenny H: “he…bkhj…hbgughoh… Me: “Wha-aaat? I can’t hear you! Hellloooo! Are you there?!?!” Jenny H: pause…”gvfkfvk. vuogioucfrtsetk!” Me: “I CAN’T HEAR YOU!!! Whaaat?!” All of a sudden my heart is thumping angrily in my chest. God help those around me when I eventually lose my hearing one day. You think I’m cranky now? Just wait. “Whaaa-aaaat?!”

3. The endless varieties of Cream of _____ Soup. Ok, Cream of Mushroom, Cream of Chicken; that’s cool. But Cream of Asparagus? Really? Gross. I went to the grocery store earlier today to buy a couple of cans of Cream of Mushroom soup. Innocent enough, right? Wrong! I had to wade through every Campbell’s version of Cream of Mushroom soup. Low-fat, no-fat, Healthy Request, no-trans fat, no-mushroom, no-flavor, the list goes on. I never could find the plain, regular version I was looking for. Finally I just grabbed the Publix brand and was on my way.

4. Daylight saving time. I don’t get it. I don’t like it. And as much as I love any excuse to put my kids to bed before 7pm, it still bugs me. It is depressing. But what irritates me even more than DST is when people write about it excitedly on Facebook. “OMG, yay! Another hour in my day! Woo-hoo!” Yuck. Or, “I just love this longer day, I could get used to this!” Really? Are you so short-sighted that you can’t understand that you are basically trading this one stupid hour for your entire soul? Seriously. I would happily give up several hours to make this DST nonsense go away forever and let the sunlight last past 5:30pm year-round.

Now please tell me, what bugs you? Unless your answer is “this blog,” I would love to know! Also tell me if you have any suggestions for future blog posts!