Thursday, June 30, 2011

We live in what real estate agents would call a desirable neighborhood - quiet streets, good schools, nice houses* and because of this, many of the kids The Kid hangs out with are from upper middle class families and while we're not exactly living in abject poverty, we're definitely in a lower tax bracket than these families.

Sometimes I feel bad that I'm the mom at basketball games wearing beat-up Converse instead of rhinestone flip-flops and carrying a $6 satchel with 50 pockets instead of some name brand purse.

Today I realized that it's actually better to be the mom I am - no one expects us to contribute much money for stuff, no one invites me to go shopping and I don't have to clean my house because no one is beating down my door to hang out. Kids like coming over here, though, because they can flop on the couches or run around the yard winging water balloons at each other without me yelling at them to keep it down or to use a coaster. And if I send the kid home with a belly full of something other than pork rinds and vodka, it seems like I've done my job - sometimes I even surprise everyone by whipping up some homemade food like pizza or empanadas and them the parents ask for my recipe.

So maybe I don't drive a BMW suv or vacation in the Canary Islands for a month every year, but I've also got zero pressure to be Martha Stewart (and, really, I just painted my nails today, so all of that cleaning would fuck up my sparkly dark blue manicure). In parenting, as in every other aspect of my life, my goal is to make people expect less of me. And I'm doing great at it!



*before the economy went all pear-shaped, you pretty much couldn't touch a house in this zip code for under half a million

Labels: adventures in shitty parenting

Monday, June 27, 2011

fun with telemarketers

Douche with Questionable Vocational Choices: I'm excited to tell you that, because of your phone number, you've been selected to get a $100 department store gift voucher that you can use at any department store such as Target, Walmart...

me: um... do we really consider Walmart a department store?

D w/ QVC: um... as I was saying, because you made a recent purchase, you have been selected to receive this voucher.

me: whoa, I thought you said I got it because of my phone number

D w/ QVC: So all I need from you is your credit card number to pay for the $2.95 shipping of the voucher...

me: is that voucher made of iron ore? Or are you sending it via gold-plated carrier pigeon? I can't imagine why else it would cost so much to ship a voucher? Wouldn't it just be easier to email it? Everyone shops online now...

D w/ QVC: blah blah blah blah blah blah blah [click]

Labels: first world problems

Sunday, June 26, 2011

him: we rented some movies

me: cool, what did you get?

him: we got "Paranormal Activity 2"...

me: ugh*, did you get anything for me?


him: yeah, we got some chick flick

me (thinking that I'd just checked one of those kiosks and hadn't seen anything I would want to see): really? What is it?

him: I think it's called "Fair Game" or something?

me: is that the movie with Cindy Crawford and that Baldwin brother? It's really old.

him: no, it's got Naomi Watts in it

me: Naomi Watts isn't really a chick flick kind of actress, who else is in it?

him: I don't know, I think Sean Penn?

Because, really, nothing says chick flick to me like Sean Penn. I mean, remember how good he was in "27 Dresses" and "How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days"? And who could forget how awesome he was in "The Wedding Planner"?

It turns out to be a ridonkulously boring movie about the CIA and politics and shit.

And the lesson of the day? Having a woman on the cover of the dvd does not make a movie a chick flick.


*I knew nothing about it, but a movie that is a sequel to a movie I've never seen AND filmed in that annoying quasi-documentary style is not a movie I would even pay $1 to rent

Labels: first world problems

Friday, June 24, 2011

Realtor with whom we were looking at houses today: Okay, you guys, have a good weekend! [The Kid] good luck at your tournament tomorrow, I hope you play good!

The Kid and I (as soon as she's out of earshot): ... Well

The Kid and I: jinx

The Kid and I: double jinx

The Kid and I: triple jinx

I love that he is just as persnickety about grammar AND immature as I am

Labels: adventures in shitty parenting, unrepentant grammar snob

Dear My Landlord,

I appreciate and am more than a little envious of your ability to be so handy and build-y - I mean, you built a freaking house right behind the house we live in, how cool is that?

Might I request, though, that if you're going to be all handy and build-y at the house right behind ours that you not start with that shit at 6:30AM? It's not like we live in Phoenix where 99.8% of the day is too hot to be outside, it's not supposed to be warmer than 70 today.

Here's hoping you won't be back on that table saw when I try to take a nap later.

xxoo,

me

Labels: first world problems

Thursday, June 23, 2011

Here's how smart I am sometimes -

I woke up this morning feeling like crap* and actually spent a good couple of minutes vacillating over whether or not I should call and cancel my doctor's appointment for today.

Yep, I considered calling in sick for a doctor's appointment.

Also, I've picked up so many prescriptions from Walgreen's within the last 2 weeks that everyone in the store recognizes me and is probably taking bets on what exactly my dysfunction actually is.**



*after I had gotten over my gross summer cold, The Kid was kind enough to bring home a new one from basketball camp - who says only children don't share?

** assumably, once the brand spanking new anti-anxiety meds kick in, I'll stop worrying about completely ridonkulous things like that.

Labels: I'm an idiot

Saturday, June 18, 2011

on the eve of my first fatherless Father's Day

I was in the middle of this post about my dad, mostly childhood stuff and nonsense, but I couldn't really get it to say what I wanted to say and then I realized that it was a bunch of memories that I probably needed to keep just for me.

I will say this, though - if my dad were the type of beer-swilling, little-league-coaching, backyard-barbecuing dad that's been portrayed in the seventy seven kajillion commercials for polo shirts, power tools and edible arrangements I've seen in the last month, I would probably be a basket case right now. As it is, I get a little verklempt every time I see his name on the first page of contacts in my phone or when gmail suggests that I might want to add him onto certain emails I send.

Labels: pointless whining

Friday, June 17, 2011

I finally get in touch with the doctor's office lady and she says that my bloodwork shows I'm extremely low in Vitamin D* - She said it like that "extremely low in Vitamin D", you could actually hear the italics in her voice. I know, I know, you'd think my sunny personality alone would be enough to keep me stocked up, but apparently, it's not. It probably doesn't help either that I don't often eat fish, I avoid milk because I'm sporadically lactose intolerant and when I get the depression, the last thing I want to do is go out and frolic in the sun.

So... yay, a new pill to take.


*how extremely low, you ask? Normal Vitamin D levels are 30-74 blahblahs/per blahblah and my level was 9 blahblah/per blahblah

Labels: le crazy

Thursday, June 16, 2011

(necessary backstory: it's been about 2 months or so since I've felt anything but bummed out and mostly absent from my own life, so I finally decided to suck it up and make an appointment with the doctor - he upped my anti-depressant and sent me to get some blood drawn so they could make sure there was nothing wrong [past the obvious, of course])

Dear Doctor's Office Lady Who Left Me A Somber Voicemail That My Bloodwork Was Back And She Wanted To Speak To Me About It,

I really appreciate you not returning my call after I returned your call, I really appreciate having the entire night to watch episodes of "House" and stress the hell out and about what it potentially wrong with me (past the obvious, of course).

Thanks a heap!

xxoo,

me

Labels: le crazy, letter to

Saturday, June 11, 2011

I don't care that it's only 60-something degrees and overcast*

I have a case of Otter Pops in my freezer, so it's officially summer**



 *suck it, people in Arizona and all over the freaking South, I actually had to put on a cardigan when I went out to look for ripe apricots this morning

**Additionally, school got out yesterday, so that kind of makes it summer, too

Labels: kind of a dork

Wednesday, June 08, 2011

"Wife committed to Weiner"

"NYers slightly favor Weiner"

"Weiner calls Bill Clinton"

"Weiner's got competition"

"It's a matter of time for Weiner"

"What was Weiner thinking"

Dear Representative Weiner, 

The only thing I know about your politics is that you're super liberal (OMG, ME TOO!) and I don't care whether or not you tweeted your pics of yourself to random skanks, that's between you and your internet service provider (and your wife, too, I suppose), but seeing your name in headlines makes me giggle so much that I hope you stay in politics forever and ever and ever.

xxoo,

me

Labels: letter to, random pop culture reference

Tuesday, June 07, 2011

Just getting prepared for summer...

*


*j/k - he actually locked himself into the carrier, he was trying to prove that there was no way for the new dog** to get out of the crate that she is all too capable of getting herself

** yes, new dog, she's a six-year-old Boston Terrier (totally copying my sister) who was a stray, then adopted, then returned to the shelter because she was "too mellow" - she's great with the dog and the cats and sleeps about 23.5 hours of the day and if she were house-trained***, she would be the perfect
 dog



*** for effing real, how does a dog get to be 6 and not trained at all? Seriously, she doesn't even know "sit".

Labels: adventures in shitty parenting, I take pictures

Friday, June 03, 2011

Either I'm getting stupider, or there is way too much math involved in purchasing toilet paper.

Seriously, I must have been standing in the paper products aisle at Albertson's this afternoon for a good ten minutes trying to figure out, between the double rolls, triple rolls and "8 jumbo rolls = 18 regular rolls" a common denominator so I could break it down by cost.

Labels: I'm an idiot