Things People Should Know

1. Chechnya is not the same as the Czech Republic. Not even close.

2. Strapless dresses don't make teenage boys have lustful thoughts. Teenage boys - and the men they grow into - can pretty much have lustful thoughts at any time, in any place, over any thing. If you don't believe me, look at all the different kinds of fetish porn there are out there.

3. Anna Maria Island, Florida, is totally awesome.

4. The West, Texas disaster was caused by a private company and a lack of government oversight. Yet the same people who voted against aid to Hurricane Sandy victims and who protest "big government" and regulations are now asking for Federal Aid. Those people? Are total assholes.

5. Rape culture exists.

6. You can tell any kind of story you want at Band Back Together. Really.

7. My daughter can go through a hurricane simulator and come out with hair that is even more adorable.

Fabulous Friday, Part Deux (maybe)

It could be part trois. Or even part quatre. I'm too lazy to go back and look at that shit. Probably because my brain is clogged with movies where Charlie Sheen pretends to be Tom Cruise, but funny. They were some of my favorites back in the '80's, which I suppose means my teenage crush feelings were actually curses of some sort. Now they're jokes, River Phoenix is dead and I'm starting to feel powerful and guilty at the same time.  What was I talking about?

I haven't been sleeping well this week, so I apologize for not making sense. But here's a list of things that sleep-deprived me found fabulous this week:

1. Hot Guy and I saw Les Miserables on our wild movie New Year's Eve date. The movie was fabulous, Hot Guy was fabulous for going out on the date despite his cracked ribs (someone might be too old for sledding with the children, ahem) and my parents were fabulous for watching the kids. 

2. House Republicans wouldn't vote for Hurricane Sandy relief funds or the Violence Against Women Act. Obviously, not technically fabulous but a great illustration of just how extremely biased and reactionary they are. 

3. This end of year post by LucidLotus. Freaking fabulous. 

4. Technically this was last week, but I love that my cousin has moved to New York and comes out to celebrate the holidays in the burbs. 

5. During my family history project, I discovered that two of Hot Guy's Puritan forebears were whipped for having a "filthy dalliance" and allowed to marry underage because they had "spoiled themselves for all others". I think that is my new favorite family story. 

6. There's a new Thursday Next book out. I love these books by Jasper Fforde so much that I don't know how to explain them well enough to do them justice. If you liked Jane Eyre, you should try reading the first in the series: 

7. There's a new season of Dance Moms. Trashy TV does not get more fabulous than Dance Moms.

Like Gravity on Jupiter

I got nothing.

Obviously, with my lack of posting and all. How are you?

There's a lot of stuff that I don't want to think about right now, to be honest. And I find it really hard to type with my head buried in the proverbial sand. Or up my ass. Proverbially. Whatever.

I miss blogging when I don't write. I miss my blogging community. I miss all four of my wonderful readers. So. Look, here's a list of stuff I haven't wanted to tell you about:

1. A wonderful band member died. I will be honoring her memory in a later post.

2. Some dear friends are very worried about the health of family members. There's absolutely nothing I can do or say because it's probably not going to be okay. And that makes my heart hurt for them.

3. We've had some major financial setbacks. Again. Things could turn out for the better, or we could be living in a trailer on my in-laws' rural Kansas property before you know it.

4. Newtown, in addition to heart break and tears, has given me reminders of things I'd rather forget. When I was teaching, I had this crazed parent. Who made threats. Against me. While I was 8 months pregnant with Lovebug. I had plan about hiding my students in the closet, blankets and a hammer stashed near the window in case I had time to get them out. I pretended to be just fine about everything, because that's what I do. And things did turn out fine. Except for the sads I seem to be having.

But!

I know that I am so very, very blessed. Part of my avoidance has also been in pursuit of a wonderful Christmas, which we had. Another part of the avoidance has been this family history project I'm doing, which has been terribly interesting. So the sads aren't winning, they're just dragging me down.

It's like trying to dance on Jupiter. You can still do it, but the gravitational pull makes it a hell of a lot harder.

Help Me, Honda

"And could you stop at the bank too?" I asked Hot Guy, feeling only slightly guilty. 

"Really? All I'm going to do is run around in the car all day!" he replied, exasperated. 

My car is in the shop. I think they need to rebuild it or something. Since we can't get a new car and the one thing I forgot to research when originally looking for a minivan was how well they last, I shouldn't be surprised. But 2 days without my own car is starting to get on everyone's nerves, let me tell you.

Bit of advice: Do not buy a Kia unless you want a cheap, safe car that you will only use for two years.   

Anyway, Hot Guy is sick of running errands and my mom has other stuff to do besides pick up the kids twice a day. Not that they are saying so, of course. But I can tell that my deep appreciation for their help is not making up for the fact that filling in for me is apparently kind of annoying.

Bonus: They're going to stop wondering why I don't accomplish more during the day. 

This is one of those times that I wish I was a famous blogger so that some car company would give me a car to blog about. Does that happen? Do people get cars? Can I pitch Honda to give me an Odyssey to blog about every day? Because I totally would. Every. Single. Day.

Thought: This is probably why I'm not a famous blogger. Only a car could get me to post every day anymore. 

Look at that face, Honda (or Toyota or Chrysler. I love Hondas, but I could totally be swayed). Wouldn't you love to use it to advertise your product? I will totally let you. . .as long as you give me a minivan. It can be used. You can even give me one of those horrendous gold ones, I don't care. 

Do you think that's a good start for my pitch letter? 

Is being dependent on others for rides starting to drive me insane? 

Was "Help Me, Rhonda" the worst Beach Boys song ever? 

Happy Native Plant Day

I'm trying to keep up with this weekday blogging thing, even though I totally skipped yesterday because it was a holiday. And by holiday, I mean that my kids didn't go to school. Not that I'm all into celebrating Columbus. 

Because, let's be honest, he was kind of dick. And the Vikings had already discovered North America. Plus, you know, all the people who were already here. 

Perhaps I should celebrate Canadian Thanksgiving instead. My one Irish great-grandmother lived in Canada for a while. Except that I'm not really clear on how the holiday works. Is there pie? Turkey? I actually know some Canadians, so it's not like I couldn't ask. I've just been too busy bitching about Columbus Day. 

Do you think it helps that we went to the pumpkin patch yesterday? Is celebrating a native plant on Columbus Day subversive? 

I can't believe I actually got a picture while Hugmonkey was in there for .02 seconds. 

Wait, pumpkins are native to North America, right? 

Google seems to think so. Phew. 

That's it. From now on I'm celebrating Columbus Day as Native Plant Day. 

Random Babbling

I am writing this through my Internet Explorer browser. I can't remember the last time I used Internet Explorer; everything looks really weird this way. But for the last few days I haven't been able to get to Blogger through my Chrome browser.

I am now remembering why I originally left Blogger.

Anyway, that's why I didn't blog on Wednesday. I spent all my writing time trying to figure out what the heck was going on.

I am considering trying Wordpress again for The Reading Bitch Blog, which I swear is going to happen.

This post kinda sucks, doesn't it?

I am so far behind on writing, I don't know what I am thinking by starting another blog. My goal is to somehow get caught up this weekend. But not on Saturday because we've got stuff going on then.

Always so much stuff going on.

Recently I looked into whether our family could join the Peace Corps. I think it's all those pictures my cousin keeps posting about homeschooling in Hawaii. Not that they're looking for Peace Corps volunteers in Hawaii. As far as I can tell, they're not really recruiting people to move to Hawaii.

We are also on Day 3 of rain around here and I think it's starting to get to me. And my allergies. In light of this post about nothing and the fact that I missed Wordless Wednesday, I give you this:

At least fall is pretty, right?

My Boobs, Revisited

Apparently I've never posted on September 28th before. I've been blogging for five and a half years and when I decided to do one of the SITS Girls writing prompts developed by the wonderful Tracie, I could not find a post from September 28th of any year.

I did have one from September 29th. It's sort of about my boobs and we all know that when I write about my boobs, I get a lot more traffic.

You see, when I looked over the prompts, I already had my posts written for Monday-Wednesday. And the one for Thursday suggested I share a fall craft* or autumn recipe. I imagined writing this for my Thursday post:

Fall recipe: Try a new place for cider donuts! Or from a new pizza place! Buy those apple cider munchkins from Dunkin Donuts, they're pretty good.

Yeah, I'm so not meant to be a food blogger.

Anyway, the Friday prompt suggested sharing a post from a previous September 28th. Or, failing that, the same week. So here we are.

Picture from approximate era of breastfeeding post. 

*I actually do know a lot of easy art projects. Really. But they're not the cute kind that gets pinned on Pinterest. They're for lazy people who want their kids to do all the work.

Artichoke Wednesday

Because.

There was this email conversation with The Brains last night. About how awesome yesterday's post would have been if I'd been angry with an artichoke, not an article. (Thank you, Dawn) And Aunt Becky was all like, "I'm writing that post, bitches!" Or something to that effect. And Tracie was all like, "I already have! Hah!" And Carol Anne said she was in. I think Cindy and LucidLotus were really talking about fashion. But anyway.

That's how "Artichoke Wednesday" happened. If I had technical skills, there would be a button and a linky here. Instead, I give you this:

From TurmericSaffron. 

So, artichokes. Just for the record, I have never gotten mad at an artichoke. I think I probably could, though, if I tried to make something with one. Um, like spinach and artichoke dip. I seriously can't think of anything else you would make with an artichoke, but then again my children are known to get their anti-vegetable stance from me, so what the hell do I know? 

Other than artichokes look like they'd be hard to cut up. Hot Guy is sure I'm going to slice off a finger with my (lack of) cutting technique, but the only time I've even cut myself was when I was trying to slice a melon someone else's way. So, at least in my slow, messy way, I'm doing something right. But the artichoke would probably confuse me. It looks like maybe you could just pull it apart? And then mash it for the dip? 

That sounds  like a lot of work when it won't be as good as guacamole. Okay, no dip is as good as guacamole (which I do know how to make, mainly because it looked pretty easy when the waiter at this Mexican restaurant did it and then Hot Guy showed me how), but some come close.  Though only a really good spinach and artichoke dip could and I've only had a couple of those in my lifetime. Though that may be the spinach's fault. 

Spinach is kind of gross, after all. 

I think I need a good, easy recipe that has to do with artichokes. Also, directions on how to cut up an artichoke. Then I could fairly judge whether artichokes piss me off.