Hello Eye Candy

I have the bed to myself until next Sunday. It's really pretty awesome. The hubby left for Georgia last Friday and while I'm sure I'll be missing him by the time he gets back, right now it's just what the doctor ordered. My house is clean, the laundry is caught up and I can get on the computer any time I want.

M (the best friend, M) came over to my mom's w/her family on Thanksgiving. I'm going to have to come up with a name for all the silly/airheaded/kinda dumb things she says because, honestly, I don't think I've ever spent any length of time around her that something that I find humorous doesn't come out of her mouth. For real.

Anyway, M is obsessed with Twilight. Now, don't get me wrong, I LOVE ME SOME VAMPIRES, but I can be reasonable about it (I resisted buying a "Team Edward" shirt the other day). Anywayz, months ago, she was telling me about how much she loved Edward after watching the first Twilight movie. I had already read all the books, so I told her she was going to love Jacob. I could totally tell he was her type. She wasn't convinced. Well, she watched New Moon and of course, I was right. I told you I'm never wrong. She loves Jacob now.

To get back to my story, we were sitting on my mom's back patio and she's just going on and on about how cute Jacob is (she just turned thirty in October. Did I mention that?) when I tell her he's only seventeen. She reassures me that she doesn't care at all. I also told her "I told you so" (even though I hate when people do that) and she says, and I quote, "I'm kind of incest with both of them".

Geez.

So, I feel like an English teacher and correct her. "I think you mean obsessed." She just laughs and what can I do but laugh with her.

I finally made it to the theater to watch New Moon on Saturday.



Watching it on the big screen makes for some hello good eye candy. I felt like a dirty old woman. I'm 29, he's 17. My son is 12, almost 13, which makes him closer to my child's age than mine. Eww.



And for the record, I'm still Team Edward. The broody quality to his stance, expression, eyes, the way he holds his mouth....melt. I don't care if his muscles are painted on.

"Rover"

My mom and I were talking this morning (she always comes over for a visit on Sunday mornings)about some of the stupid things my brother and I did when we were young (and he still continues to do, but that's a whole different chapter).

My dad is this big truck driver who is most likely the sweetest, most soft hearted person I've ever met. Don't get me wrong, he's an ass (he is a man after all) but he's also very sweet. With a really foul mouth, and a sense of humor that would offend as many as it appeals to, he's really a hell of a guy. My mom fell in love with him when she was fifteen and became best friends with his little sister, my Aunt D. One day, she was hanging out with Aunt D, when my dad pulled up to the house in his '67 Chevy camaro (he's got excellent taste in cars, too). He's nearly six and a half feet tall and back in the day, his hair was shoulder length and really blond. My mom was awestruck. They were sitting on the porch when he breezed by. He was eighteen and didn't pay attention to his little sisters or their friends. So my mom made the first move. She stuck her head in the door and asked if he could come out and play, to which he replied, "my momma won't let me". As the saying goes, the rest is history.

Throughout my childhood, they were either fighting or making up. My dad was a dog, but one thing about him, he really did love my mom. She was just as badly in love with him. I say badly, because I'm almost convinced that the level of affection and passion they had for one another wasn't exactly healthy. As a child, I thought that every ones parents were as volatile as mine. Not until they split up when I was eleven did it start to sink in that maybe they were crazy. For real. That was also the year I found out that they had divorced when I was five. They were back together by the time I turned twelve and remained that way until I was knocked up at fifteen. Then my dad went a little crazy (can you say mid life meltdown?) and decided to begin openly dating other people. My mom decided she was going to kill him until I finally got through to her that murdering him probably wasn't the best idea. I moved her out into an apartment that same day and three months later my mom married one of my dad's old friends. It was a damn mess. For real. Dad was dumbfounded. He really had thought mom would wait on him to sow his wild oats. Mom is still married to the same guy a dozen years later, but I know that both of them have their moments of missing the other. Not that they don't love the people they're with. They just have so much history together, I don't think they would or could ever completely get over the other.

So, a quick story from my childhood.

We were in a restaurant and my brother asked my dad what the waitress's name was. Apparently (I don't remember), the waitress wasn't what you would call a "looker", so my dad being the smart ass he is, said "Rover". Well, Charlie (my brother) didn't know what the meaning of "Rover" was at his young and tender age of maybe ten. He began yelling "Rover" while holding his glass up in the air for a refill. My dad was mortified. He yelled at Charlie and wouldn't let him eat, even though it was his own damn fault. My mom gave Charlie his plate back and I don't remember how the waitress behaved towards us after that, as I was probably seven years old, but I wonder if she ever thinks about the asshole kid that was calling her rover....

Moral of the story is........don't be an ass.

29 going on 18

So, yesterday was the wonderful, awesome eating-athon we call Thanksgiving...Thank you for all the wonderful food, as I LOVE, LOVE, LOVE to eat! The mashed potatoes, turkey, ham, stuffing and wonderful pumkin pie, not to mention the rocky road that my husband's grandma makes every year gave me such a hang over that I slept from five o'clock yesterday afternoon until six o'clock this morning. For Real. It was AWESOME!

Every year, my brother, whom I don't see nearly enough of, shows up at my mom's for the food and while some families have football viewing or playing traditions, and others sit around and play cards and tell gruesome hunting tales, and yet others sit around and peruse the dreaded Black Friday ads (idiots), my brother and I have our own tradition. We typically fight. Seriously. I know. I'm a damn hillbilly that lives in a more uptown home than the trailer in the woods I grew up in. I guess it brings me back to my childhood when we would get into knock down, drag out fist fights....Anyway, he always wins, but I can usually hurt him at least once before we call truce. Its our thing.

Well, yesterday I went and sat beside him on the couch before blessings were said. He was really nervous, not quite sure of what my next move would be. It was funny because the anticipation was clearly killing him. He finally just told me to make my move and get it over with. I wasn't going to move to soon, ya know? I was like one of those caged lions, just ready to pounce.



The asshole elbowed me. I wasn't ready for it, as I'm usually the one that gets the jump, but not this year. And it was so ON....I dove on top of him, and he was just trying to protect himself. I sent my fist flying, knowing I was going to connect with his bicep, when he had the GALL, the NERVE, to try to protect himself by throwing his arm up in the air and my knuckles connected alright. With his elbow. Let me tell you, I hurt myself. For REAL. I think I've broken one of those itty bitty bones that is located somewhere down in your hand, the one that runs from your pinkie finger? That one. My hand is swollen and my hubby has zero sympathy. Jerk.

His argument is that I'm getting too old to behave in such a way. He might be right, but doesn't he understand? It's tradition. Just like the Packers and Cowboys playing on Thanksgiving, and Black Friday, it just wouldn't be Thanksgiving without our annual fight.

Anyway, M is even now as we speak (or whatever) on his way to our cabin in the GA to hunt with a passel of friends for ten days and I have no idea how in the hell I'm supposed to drive my stick shift (it was my right hand). If it's still hurting on Monday, I guess I have to go to the doctor. I really hate going to the doctor (and it's not the insurance, we've got pretty good coverage). It seems like every time I go, it's because I've done something stupid, like the time I was trying to do a split and tore my hamstring (I had to prove I was more flexible than a six foot four idiot - Love you, E, in case you ever stumble across this) or the time I was stabbed (don't ask)....I'm really going to hate telling the doc how I hurt my hand. I'm trying to think of something to tell him, that would make sense with the injury without making me look like a complete jackass. Drawing a blank here. On the plus side, I could probably get a camo colored cast. That would be cool. Not sure the people at work ( a bunch of attorneys) would appreciate it, but who knows? It might make them lighten up a bit.


Happy Thanksgiving. I hope you truly thought about all the blessings in your lives and gave thanks. Peace out.

Fantabulous Key West

Key West totally agrees with me....It was wonderful! Stayed out too late, drank too much, didn't eat enough, danced, danced, and danced some more. The gay clubs were awesome and the drag show "Aqua" was fantabulous! My friend, S, whom I went with are already planning on a return trip next November.

Have you ever been? No? Then what are you waiting for? This is definitely a place for your girlfriends and you to go...We went snorkeling and there was a boat race and tons of things to do.

The only people I wouldn't recommend Key West to would be if you're homophobic (shame on you) or if you have kids, because I saw all kinds of stuff on just the t-shirts that I wouldn't want my boys being witness to. And the gay and lesbian couples abound, which I personally find delightful and refreshing. I don't think I saw one unhappy person the entire time I was there. (unless you include me the morning after tying one on and sitting on a boat forty five minutes from shore)

If you go, let me know how you enjoyed it! And please tell Inga @ Aqua the cowgirl says hi!!

My Own Movie

So, I was reading a blog and the girl mentioned who she wanted to play her in a movie, which made me wonder who I would want to play me if my life was interesting enough for a movie to be made about it (it also brought me back to the original Scream, where Neve Campbell pondered who would play her and it ended up being Tori Spelling, but anywayz.......). I've been told that I look like Julia Roberts (HA! Not even a little..)so if I had to pick her it would be the version of herself that she gave in Erin Brockovich...or maybe Helen Hunt in Pay It Forward.



And that is extremely disturbing because I think that a white trashy tall blond in a tight shirt and super short skirt fits me....And really it doesn't, but that's how I think of myself on the inside even though I'm more of a Lorelei Gilmore kind of person on the outside (wardrobe wise....I won't even claim to be as clever as the character Miss Lauren Graham was lucky enough to portray).




Weird, huh? I wish I was more of a Pink kind of girl (she's super cool to me) or maybe a Gretchen Wilson if I want to take the country bent....
I guess I'm more fascinating in my own mind than I show the world.

For instance, I've not told a soul about writing this blog. I'm way too private for that. I don't care if the cyber world gets a peak at my sometimes unflattering/humorous/raunchy side, but I would be embarrassed if someone I actually KNEW got the inside scoop on me. Of course, I've put real pictures of myself on here, so if anyone stumbles across it, then oh, well, but I'm not going to just volunteer the information.

I mean, what if one of my old rivals was to get a peak inside my brain? How weird would that be? Personally, I would LOVE to come across something like this that would bare the intimate details of some of my former spatting partners for the whole world to see....But then again, I'm extremely nosy.

Anywayz, as I was saying, I wonder who would play me? I've got a few personal stories that have made the local paper a time or two, mostly really bad crap that has happened within the family, so if a movie was ever made about my family, it would probably be one of those crappy maudlin movies that comes on Lifetime and then I wouldn't be surprised if Tori Spelling didn't get the part, or maybe the girl that played Jo on The Facts of Life. She seems to always be on that channel.



So, my husband is currently sick, coughing, snotting, eyes watering...I mean, for REAL sick. I wish he'd get better, because I'm leaving for Key West with a girlfriend on Thursday and I hate to leave him here with the boys while he's not feeling good (not bad enough that I'm not going to go, but still). He needs to hurry up and get better. He's the most pitiful sick person I've ever come across. He just wallows in it, but tries to still carry on, business as usual. Which means that I come home from a long day at work to hear him bitch and moan in between lots of damp, nasty sounds coming from his many different orifices.

God, please let him get better quick or at least make the week go by faster so that I can escape. Amen.

Kids Say The Darndest Things....

Last night, I was leaving to pick up some dinner when my nine year old, D, asked if he could ride with me. I said sure. This is rare, especially considering the fact that he was out in the yard playing.

He gets in the car and doesn't say anything all the way to KFC. After getting the food, I started driving home and he's looking out the window with this extremely thoughtful look on his face, so I say,

"You got something on your mind, kid?"

He looks at me, very seriously and says, "Yes."

"Well, what's up?"

"I was just wondering, can I breath out of my nose and hold my mouth wide open at the same time?"

Well, I wasn't sure, so I tried it and sure enough, you can.


It was kind of funny, because I was thinking maybe he had something really serious that he wanted to talk to me about, but no, he just wanted to ride with me.

The whole conversation reminded me of a joke that Jeff Foxworthy would tell. It was about his daughter staring out the window as they were driving down the rode and he noticed she had this big smile on her face. He asked her what she was thinking about and her smile got wider and she answered, "Candy."



I just love kids....well, really only mine, but some of the things that kids think about is really refreshing. Wouldn't it be nice to be able to revert to that from time to time? The silly things that can make a child happy? I wish it was that easy for me.....The thought of candy making me blissfully happy. Usually, when I'm thinking about candy, I'm p.m.s.ing and I'm ready to bash someones face in with my stapler. If I'm holding a three musketeer bar, chances are you should maybe, probably, keep your distance.

Fantasy vs. Reality

Party planning is for the birds....

Every holiday season for the last several years, I've helped organize a benefit for the needy kids in the area. The party itself is fun. Once you buy your ticket, there's music, free food, all you can drink...but getting there is a real pain in the ass.

I remember watching The Wedding Planner w/Jennifer Lopez and thinking what a wonderful job it would be to plan big parties. You get to wear pretty clothes and plan something that is special, or fun, or for the greater good....Hah! It's really a bunch of spreadsheets, counting numbers and meeting with people that have fifty other things they'd rather be doing than talking to you. I feel like a damn bill collector, calling and harassing people about what their menu is, how many tables they're going to need, how we're going to get power to their booths.....and the worst, are you coming or not? All the while praying that the weather holds, that it's not too cold, or God forbid, it rains...

People totally disregard the R.S.V.P. aspect....I think I could write a book entitled "Laurie's Party Etiquette". It probably wouldn't sell too well, as I would just gripe the entire time about people's LACK of etiquette. I also have a job to do, people. Give me a few simple answers and I wouldn't be pushing it to the last minute. Procrastinators suck!

Anyway, I'm in the home stretch now, so everything is just going to have to fall into place. There's no choice in the matter. I won't have it any other way.

When you were a little kid, did you have this picture of your life and how it was going to turn out? Remember that game, M.A.S.H? I can't remember exactly how it went, but I remember you would pick several careers, who you were going to marry, the car you were going to drive....and the answers where a process of any, many, miny, mo. I always had such a glamorous life, according to the outcome of my M.A.S.H. games.....

And another thing, when I was a little kid, hell, when I was a teenager I had this glamorous view of my prince charming. We are conditioned from the time we're little girls to believe some man is going to come in and sweep us off our feet. We should be teaching girls that men can be jerks, they sometimes are not very conscientious when it comes to wiping and they expect us to work and then come home and make sure their stomachs are taken care of, among other things. That's why, girls, you should at least get you a good looking man, that way you at least have something pleasant to look at, at least until they discover the pleasures of sitting around on the weekends with their buddies, drinking beer, playing poker and telling blood thirsty tales on their hunting kills.....Eventually they all get old...I figure I have about five more good years out of M and then he's going to go fat, bald and boring.

The Fantasy



The Reality



I don't remember ever playing the game M.A.S.H., requesting a job that I'm ignored while trying to do, driving a mini cooper and living in a house that constantly stays messy. Once upon a time, my home was my retreat, now it's just a place I go to maybe get six-seven hours of sleep before I'm gone to the next place. So long as my tub is clean, there are no dirty dishes in the sink and I don't have to squat over my toilets, I can continue to live there. But I won't even mention the laundry....

True Blue Forever

Me and M met on the first day of first grade, standing in line for the water fountain. Our first conversation went something like this:

Me: Hi, I'm Laurie
M: I'm M
We stood there for a second, looking at the fairy tale poster hanging on the wall.
Me: I love Sleeping Beauty
M: I love Cinderella

A great friendship was born that day. We've had somewhere in the neighborhood of three fights in the twenty plus years since. The first one, I told a little boy that wore coveralls to school every day in the third grade that M wore a bra. Turned out she liked him and was humiliated. Fourth grade, I loved Micah. He was this adorable little tow headed boy with the prettiest blue eyes. I had worked hard to befriend him. One day, he tapped me on my shoulder in class and I turned around, smiling my prettiest smile when he asked me if I thought M liked him. I felt my heart go kerplunk into the pit of my stomach. When, in quite a huff, I told M about the conversation, I was in for a big surprise when I found out M liked him too. I eventually got over the betrayal. When I was in ninth grade, I rode with M and her mom to Texas for Christmas to see M's older sister, whom had the bad idea to marry a man she met out there while staying briefly with an aunt. After about four days, M and I were sick of each other and got into a screaming match over a game of pool. We got over it, and since then, and before, she's been the sister I never had.

I remember one time when we were probably around nine, ten years old, we were walking in the woods (we both grew up in the boonies, FOR REAL) behind her house. There had been some wild hogs tearing up peoples yards and Melissa was showing me some of their foot prints in a dry creek bed. Well, as luck would have it, I had to toot and when I did, it sounded JUST LIKE a growl. Melissa was being Ms. Tutor girl and was using a stick as a pointer. When she heard what she thought was a growl, she launched that stick up into the air and went running for her life, screaming at me to come on, "They're coming! They're coming!" at the top of her lungs. I about pissed myself I was laughing so hard. She was probably four football fields away before I could yell at her that it was okay, it was just me.


1998



Another time, we were adults, we took a trip up to St. Augustine. Her boyfriend, my husband and us were riding around, when in a tone of great puzzlement, she asked, "I wonder why, in Florida of all places, there are so many lighthouses?" Now, let me tell you, the car went silent. Finally I said, "Maybe because we're on a peninsula. Geez, M." Of course, she's still never lived that one down.

She's had two little girls over the last few years, and watching her become a mommy has been awesome. She's a really good one, probably because she worries that she's going to do everything wrong. She still has her moments though. A few months ago, she called. This is how it went:

M: Hey, girl.
Me: How are you and the girls?
M: We've been a little under the rain.

Now, it took me a few beats to figure out she was trying to tell me they had been a little under the weather.

I have my moments, too, but mine tend to be with the pronunciation of certain words, words like chaos, island, rendevous, pavilion, adolescent...the list goes on and on. You shoulda heard me in fifth grade when I had to give an oral report on the philosopher Socrates. I thought my teacher was going to blow the vein out of her forehead trying to repress her laughter. I thought I must've done a horrible job until at the end she told me the correct pronunciation of his name and it wasn't "So-crates".

When I was eleven, M's daddy was struck by lightning and died. It was the first death that profoundly affected me. M and I grew up in each other's pockets, so her family was my family and vice versa. Her mom was the first I told about being pregnant when I was fifteen. In July of '03, she lost her fiancé in a car accident and then three years ago, we lost her mom to crohn's disease. Earlier this year, her sister was in a serious accident and was airlifted to the hospital. She had broken her pelvic bone in multiple places, so badly in fact, that they refused to body cast her because if she started bleeding internally from the breaks, they didn't think they would have enough time to cut her out of the cast before she bled to death. It was terrifying, thinking that we were going to lose her, too. She pulled through and is still healing even now. I tell you this, not so anyone can feel sorry for her, but because the strength a human heart has is absolutely amazing. M is still one of the happiest people I know. She can put a pretty smile on her face no matter what is going on in her life. I think she lives by the mantra, fake it until you make it. Smile, even when life sucks, even when you think there is no way you can possibly deal with the pain you are going through. If you can do this, you can overcome any grief, any hardship, any bad mood, all the money troubles you may have. And please, never, ever, ever, think that it can't get any worse, because I guarantee you, it always can get harder. Even if it does, fake it until you make it. Smiling makes everyone feel better.


2008

Monday's suck

Hellooo, cyber world.

It's Monday and I'm never at my best on Mondays.....Today, I'm not quite sure why, as I'm digging this time change. I totally felt like I got to sleep in today, even though I was up at 5:45. I figure it'll take at least 3 days before my body adjust and then 5:45 is going to suck as much as it ever did.

So, three months ago my sister and law and I began a workout routine called P90X. We finished last week and now have moved onto some circuit training which takes half the time but is filled with cardio. I HATE cardio. I feel like my lungs are going to explode and a chamber of my heart will fill up with so much blood that its going to burst because my poor little veins can't pump it out to the rest of my body fast enough. I HATE cardio.

This morning, the lady on the tape is overseeing her two grunts behind her, each with a kick ass body and she actually says into the lens, "If she can do it, so can you." As though the girl is some kind of fat ass, or even flabby ass that has had two kids and smokes a pack of cigarettes a day....It's a hell of a way to start your Monday morning, let me tell ya..

So, my arms are looking awesome, if I do say so myself. I'm skinny, but not toned, at least not until lately. My stomach still needs more work, and my J-Lo booty probably isn't going anywhere, but that's okay. It's looking better than it ever has, so I want to say thanks to Ms. Lopez and the Kardashian sisters for making a plump bottom sexy. And Beyonce, of course...and whoever wrote that song "Big Bottomed Girls"...

So anyway, Halloween was on Saturday. M and I had an adult party to go to after the boys went trick or treating. Well, I go to put on my costume (I was the Octoberfest girl, Gretchen) and blow out the ENTIRE zipper. Hello, I just tried this thing on four days before and it fit fine! WTH? (Read previous paragraph if you don't get my puzzlement)

So, I ended up going out of costume while M went as a beer can with a Joe Dirt mullet wig. We were really classy.

Next month I'm going to Key West for the first time ever, which is saying something. I think every Floridian shoulda been to Key West by the time they hit twenty(inaudible).....One of my girlfriends (purely platonic :-0) are going down to live it up for four days among the sun, sea and fabulous cross dressing shows. There is actually going to be some kind of speed boat race down there at the same time, which should be fun. Getting excited! I even have a snorkeling trip all lined up. Man, I'm so organized. Do you have any idea how much money they want for a plane ticket down there, though? From Tampa, it's $400! So, we're making it a road trip. It's gonna suck, but for the eight hundred dollars we'll be saving, totally worth it. I drive a mini, so fitting all our stuff in there should be interesting, but I have faith.

Last year, I went to Ft. Lauderdale w/two other girls for an mma fight and we managed to fit everything in, so it should be fine.

Have any of your ladies ever been to a fight? No? Well, let me give you a glimpse on what you're missing out on...Mr. White, I expect a finder's fee on any new pay per view orders..jk, unless you're willing to pay me...)