Jammin'

I was on my way home tonight and a cool song came on the radio. I really liked it and I was jamming out when I realized I was car-dancing to Michael Jackson's "Beat It."
Oh well.

For Your Reading Pleasure

I found some of my old poems today. Talk about morbid! They all talk about dying and crap. Good grief. Let us all take a moment to thank the Lord for pharmaceuticals and those who dole them out. I've begun a new phase in my reading. I've gone from Stephen King to the classics. Today I came home from the library with Tolstoy, Steinbeck, Dickens, Dickinson, Dumas and Twain. What was I thinking? I started War and Peace thinking that since it has been hailed as "the best novel ever written" it must be good, even at 1300 pages. Right? WRONG.
I couldn't even get through the first fifty pages. I'm not a stupid person but these sentences were so complicated, using words in an order I have never seen before, that I felt utterly retarded! Bah humbug! So now I am working on Great Expectations, which looks promising. I'll let you know.
The children are at Nana's for Spring Break. Now I have no company except the nine books I brought home from the library today. I am so very bored.
So bored.
Bored.
Bored.
Bored.
People, I was so bored I was farting and laughing at myself.
Lily called me today and said she was losing a tooth, "FINALLY. NOW I can be like JOSH and ALEXIS, they don't have any TEETH." Uh, okay. Then Nana told me she didn't have a loose tooth, but that it looked like she was trying to get a molar on the right side of her mouth. Poor kid, always disappointed.
It rained all day today so I opened my window and listened to it while I wrote. I have always wanted to write a complete book but I never have. Just to give you a taste...
'She shook with fear and said "I hate you!" to which he replied, "I never asked you to love me."'
Spooky stuff huh?
I've been contemplating whether I should introduce some preschool stuff to Caleb or not, since he may be going this fall. I got online (love the Internet) and printed off a page where you had to draw a line from the letter to the picture that started with said letter. We sit.
"Caleb, what is this?"
"A crab!"
"Right! What does crab start with?"
--blank stare--
"Does it start with a cuh like a C, an err like an R, a buh like a B, or a fuh like an F?"
"B!"
"What does crab START with?"
--blank stare again--
"Does it start with cuh, err, buh or fuh?"
"Buh!"
"No, what does it START with? It ENDS with buh, but what does it START with?"
"Uh... B!"
Okay. So much for preparatory work (look at my big words!).

10 Down, 70 To Go

I am now weighing in at 229.6!!!
Go me!!!!

For The Love Of Scrapping

I've started scrap booking. Thanks Melissa. Its a very fun hobby and I enjoy making layouts, finding pictures, buying scissors, buying paper, buying punch out letters, buying special glue sticks... ok maybe my new hobby is spending money....
What I do not like is copying the pictures to put into the scrap book. Nine times out of ten they either don't scan right or don't print right. Wal-mart does have a pretty good Kodak kiosk that copies and prints pretty well.
I went there yesterday and stuck my memory stick into the machine. As I scrolled through the pictures, I came across some that were.... uh... not of my face. Or James'. I swear I actually heard the two little old ladies behind me gasp as I yanked out the stick and pounded on "Print Order" as fast as I could. Needless to say, I didn't get all the pictures printed that I had intended. I am SO glad Lily wasn't there. Oh. My. Gosh. She has this talent of making a horribly embarrassing situation WORSE.
Anyway, I mosey over to Melissa's town and I still had eight pictures to scan and print. So I gathered my courage, stuck Lily and Caleb in a buggy and headed to the Kodak picture maker. One of them was out of order. The other was being occupied by a woman who was talking very loudly on her cell phone. She stuck in her memory card, scrolled through a couple of pages of pictures, hit "Select All" and proceeded to print 233 4X6 pictures. Apparently she thought "Select All" meant select all the pictures on the screen at the time. No joke people. The kids were being entertained with a bag of doughnuts so I figured what the heck, I really needed these copies to scrap. So we waited. Here are just some snippets of conversation I had the pleasure of hearing while I waited for 45 minutes:

"Yeah, my baby daddy he be trippin' cause I tole him I hope his truck burn up in a motha *** fire or su'in cause he thank its mo' 'portant than his keed!"
"Girl, I hope they's enough paper fo yo pitchers!"
"Yeeh, dat my baby gurl right thurr, she all cute in hurr pink hoodie look like her daddy and all!"
"*** I di'nt know it be printin' like 200 of the sum***ches!!"
"Carl! CARL! This be makin' all my pitchers and stuff an not makin them into a CD!"
"Girl I think I gon run outta paper, I di'n know it be printin' all these, I'm soory!"

Yes, as it spit out print after print she made two picture Cd's of everything on her memory card. I don't even know why I waited. I guess because I love scrap booking so much and I thought on maybe the tiniest offhand chance I may get eight more to print when she was done, and the kids were being really good. Sure enough, it ran out of paper. Then she starts complaining because it didn't print out all 233 pictures, but only 189. Then there was this, my favorite part:

"CARL!! It done run out the paper, and I ain't get 'em all! You got more paper back in 'ere?"
--No--
"Kin you get sum dat paper outta that machin' right thurr? It be the same right?"
--No--
"D***. Well I guess I coulda ax Carl to cancel the *** pitchers 'cause I ain't be gettin' all my pitchers today an'way!!"

WAIT. The thought of cancelling the whole order crossed your mind?? Why didn't you cancel it?? Why am I still standing here?? THEN Carl kindly points me to a machine around the corner that will scan my pictures and print them out in 30 minutes. Gee, thanks Carl. So I scan my eight pictures while Miss Thang over there goes on and on about not getting all her pictures and then starts making remarks about the price of 2 picture Cd's and 189 prints. Hint: it was upwards of $50. No joke. The kids and I walk around the toy isle for 30 minutes and then pick up the pictures and guess what?
They look like CRAP.
By then I am thoroughly pissed at Wal-mart and the human population in general, so I storm out of there, go to Melissa's and scan my pictures.
They printed beautifully, and we had a spectacular time scrapping.
Until the kids woke up and poured three bottles of cleaning detergents onto the bedroom floor. Lily swears she was coerced into it, but I have a feeling she didn't put up much of a fight.

That Holy (?) Feeling 8

I don't know where how to classify this event, so I'll just go with Holy Feeling.
The paranormal is a pretty interesting subject. Psychics, telekinesis, telepathy, television; you know what I mean. I think some people have a God-given gift but most are just crap.
I've had a couple of... odd things happen to me throughout my life. Feeling watched, dreams about places that I see months or even years later, deja vu type stuff. Looking in to this kind of stuff really makes you wonder just how complex our brains are and how much about it that we don't know. Praise the Lord that He still has the blueprint, because I know no human could ever reproduce it. It's really insane.
Anyway, I was driving to pick up Lily one of the past 10 or so days ago. As I approached the stop sign a young kid in a white hoodie ran across the street to the corner. Not enough for me to slam on the brakes but you know. Then a vision flashed in my head of me actually hitting this kid. I mean slam thump thud hitting him. It didn't last long. I pulled to the stop sign and stopped and looked to my left, because I was turning right. No one was coming. Normally I don't look to my right because I'm not turning left and therefore do not need to know if anyone is coming from that direction (sorry Mom). So I turn...
and miss that stupid kid in the white hoodie by INCHES. Apparently he'd decided to cross the street a few seconds before I turned. Now tell me that isn't weird!!

The He-Child Sings And Other Things

I've been reading a lot of Dr. Seuss lately. Can you tell?
That song by Marky Mark, "Good Vibrations," came on the radio and Caleb was in the back seat saying "Uhhh.... yeah.... uhhhh......uh huh... Mom, this is my favorite song!!"

Lily got glasses two weeks ago. They cost $375 because they had to have a prism and bifocal lenses (thanks, Z, for that contribution). She looks so cute!

Lily type:
1 is the best number uv oll.

Scope Poke

James recently had a scope done by his gastrologist to determine if he had any ulcers, green mold etc. in his stomach. I escorted him to the hospital to drive him home after the procedure. When he finally had the thing done (they didn't have him scheduled for that day, or any other day for that matter; the usual 2 hour waiting room wait time and another hour "behind the curtain"), I was looking forward to getting out of there because I was hungry and grumpy and stuff. But no. We had to wait another 30 minutes to make sure "he handles the anesthetic alright." He didn't die when you put him under, he's fine now! So I endured 30 minutes of my husband coming off of his high.


"Whoa!! That was amazing!! They like wheeled me in there, put this thing on my face, and I was like asleep! Just like that! It was like the best short nap EVER. What was that stuff? Can you like buy it? I bet I would sleep a lot better at night. Hey, probably you would too! That was so cool, I was like OUT LIKE A LIGHT and then BAM I was in here. I gotta call Justin and let him know everything went well. We put up some of those lights in that house on the lake. See how they are recessed like that? That was so awesome. BAM!! OUT!! Is that the pictures of my stomach? Wow! It looks kinda cool! What are those bumps, do you think they're normal? I didn't even feel that scope thing, I mean I saw it but I went to sleep so fast and wow, it was over quick! Hey you should keep these pictures and scrapbook them! Wouldn't that be cool? No? Are you sure? Man, I'm hungry. Can we leave now? Wendy's sounds sooo good right now. One of those bacon double cheeseburgers, maybe like TWO I'm so hungry!! Oh hey nurse! Yeah, doing good just kind of hungry. Did you see my pictures? Gross huh? Yeah I wanted to get this done because I might be deployed here pretty soon and my parents were all worried that I would get over there and have something like MAJORLY wrong, so I thought I'd get it checked out, you know, calm the parents down. Can we take these pictures? Are you sure? Cool, thanks!"


Then I had to take his high self to Wendy's. It was fun. Then I went to Melissa's and left him at home to come off his high alone, because when you're the only sober one it sure isn't fun.

The He-Child Fibs

Lately we have been struggling with Caleb fibbing. Small things, I know, but eventually they will grow into larger things. We're just trying to get it under control now while we still can.

Papa: "Whoa boy, it stinks in this bathroom!"
Caleb: "Mimi did it."
Mimi: "I did not!!"

Me: "Caleb, did you draw on the counter?"
Caleb: "Uh, nope."
"Are you sure?"
"Uh, yeah?"
"Come here and look at it."
--trudges over--
"See, that looks like scribbles. Lily usually draws names, hearts and caricatures of her family members. This looks like something you would do."
--smiles, looking up at me--
"So... did you draw on the counter?"
"Uh, nope!"
"Who do you think did?"
"Uh, Lily!"
"Lily isn't here. It's just you and me, and i don't draw on counters."
--smiles--
"So I think you need to go get a washcloth and clean this off."
"Uh, okay!"

Weight Loss Motivation

I went to the doctor a few weeks ago because I haven't been sleeping well. Actually, I hadn't been sleeping at all. She ran all these tests that required quarts of blood and my liver enzymes came back elevated. On I went to the imaging center to have a sonogram done. They got the results back today and guess what? I have a fatty liver. The doctor said to diet and exercise and come back in three weeks for follow-up blood work. But the best part was when she said that in three months if my levels weren't normal she would be lowering or eliminating my antidepressants ("You know, because regular exercise produces endorphins and maybe you won't even need those medicines!"). I looked at her point blank and said "No you won't." Flabbergasted, she said "Uh, what?" I told her we wouldn't be messing with my antidepressants because I've tried it and it DID NOT WORK. She said we will see in three months.

I don't think she really understood how close she came to being beheaded with the sheer force of my brain waves. You don't mess with a crazy person's medications, especially if you're an R.N., C.N.P. If anyone is going to play Russian Roulette with my head, it's going to be a doctor with as many psychological letters behind his name as scholarly possible.

But if she insists, I could always do what my mom suggested: move in with her until my fatty liver is gone and I can restart my antidepressants.

On a lighter note (pardon the pun), I've lost 5 pounds!! WOO HOOO!!!!!

Lily's First Paragraph

"Mom liks wrc. Dad liks wrc to. I lik et and Mom dusnt plas (play) weth us. But Dad plas weth us." Yes, I do!!

Have you ever had writer's block? If you want to know what it feels like, pick a wall in your house, back up 3 feet and run into it repeatedly. There you go.

James got a laptop and I'm feeling, uh, left out of the fun.

A bass guitar: $169.00

PlayStation 2: $130

Guitar Hero 2: $80

Acer laptop: $710

A low maintenance wife: priceless

Writing Project

What happens when life pauses?


It had been a long, hard day. The kids were finally fed, bathed, asleep. She was tired. The kids wore her out; she prayed for patience. Prayed all day and night. When the kids cried, she prayed. When the bills couldn’t get paid, she prayed. When his raise still had not come though, she prayed. Every time she grew weary of praying, grew tired of seemingly unanswered prayers, she prayed. For faith. For strength. For comfort.
She lay there like she did ever night after reading too long. Tonight was Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck. The green library book was aged, binding loose with several pages taped back together. She held the book with affection, read each work with tenderness, turned each page with care. Her eyes soaked in every word. Too soon was it midnight, and she tore herself away. No tooth-brushing tonight.
She lay on top of the blanket and sheets. It was another humid summer night. The fan hummed lazily on medium, moving hot air over her body. She wore a thin tank top and no bottoms. She lay on her bed, her heavy eyes closing quickly. She dreamed of him. Him coming home. Him holding her. His touch.
Her eyes opened; she heard something. She lay still. It sounded like footsteps. Sandals sliding on the carpet. Rounding the corner from the living room (her heart pounded) coming in her room. Stopping. Probably her young daughter; she opened her eyes. The door was still closed. Maybe she was just hearing things.
Slipping into a doze she felt it. Her sixth sense awakened her. A strange presence close by. Peaceful. Someone standing beside the bed, leaning over to look at her. The heaviness was almost palpable. She dared not open her eyes.
"Lord? Is that you?"


Cheap motel on a forgotten street. Dingy, dirty rooms. Threadbare greenish carpet surrounding one twin bed. Blanket thin, no sheets, distorted mattress. One window, with a peeling sill and cloudy view of the load street outside. Plaid curtains she quickly pulls together. The room stinks of mold, urine and neglect. The walls are yellowish with years of smoky air. One tattered night stand holding one rotary beige phone. Probably doesn’t work. She doesn’t belong here, but she sits. She has no choice. No chance.
She lays still. Turning, she looks at the gray door with it’s two locks. Dirty doorknob, dirt-encrusted peephole. Dirty life. She doesn’t hear the commotion outside, who knows what that could be. She hears her pleas to get up, get out, go back. Just open the door. Just walk. Just go. No consequences, nothing said.
She imagines her hand on the doorknob, turning it slowly. Imagines the foggy city air as she steps outside and peers around. Imagines the dirty people sitting on dirty steps, talking about dirty things while their dirty children play. She imagines walking, step after step. Just one at a time. Back to where she came from. Before.... this.
He moves her, and that is her only movement. Her face pressed into the pillow, she coughs into the moldiness. It smells like dying. She turns her head to the side, her eyes watering. She stays still, now facing a yellowish wall. Flat, ugly, unimportant. Unseen but not overlooked. She is still.
Done. Irreparable. Yelling, slapping. Stinging pain. The door slams shut. Alone. She opens her eyes and curls her naked body into itself. She cries silently. Through her tears she sees two crumpled twenties sitting on the dirty night stand. Dirty money. Dirty deed. Dirty new beginning.

***Notes From Self***
Back when I was applying for scholarships and stuff one sponsor wanted me to write a short essay about something, only it couldn't be more than 300 words. Well, a 300 word limit is hard for me. I was like, that's just kind of pausing in the middle of a story! So then I thought, what if you could pause time and then go from person to person and see what they are doing at that moment? That was kind of the theme. Crazy I know.

Another Writing I Found Today

Just when you think you’ve put everything behind you, that you’ve effectively buried your past under heaps of dirt and concrete, something happens that reminds you that your past is still there, right behind you, under every step you take and shaping every decision you make. For some those reminders come once in a while, others more regularly. For others, like me, it happens daily, my past baring its teeth and swiping its claws at my happiness. No specific thing sets it off. You can be standing there and suddenly you smell a certain smell, hear a certain phrase. You’re caught off guard and BAM! The past pulls you back into its clutches and you have to fight with everything you have to come out on top again.
Sometimes I get tired of fighting it. Is it a sin to sit back for a few moments and relive your past, savoring old tastes, relishing old emotions? Imagining, just for a moment, that your husband is one of your past lovers? That you have no children? No responsibilities?

Scholarship Essay

Here's an essay I wrote for a scholarship I applied for.

How My World Would Be Different If I Didn't Have A Computer

A day in my life without the invention of the modern computer would be pretty boring. I would wake up around 7 a.m. and go for my usual morning walk. I would return home and shower, dress and make coffee. I would then check the mail, throwing out the junk. Upon opening my bank statement, I would find that two checks bounced last week, and I have been charged $50. Without my computer, I didn't catch my mistake in time to instantly transfer some of my savings to my checking to avoid the fees. I am angry.
After checking the mail and calling the bank, I would sit in my recliner and try to call my husband, who is in the military and stationed over seas. As usual, there is no answer. Is he okay? I haven't heard from him in a week or so. Without the computer, the leader of our support group cannot email us wives and tell us that our husband are in special training, where phones are not allowed. Instead, she must call every wife on her list of 135, which takes time that she has little of.
My day continues, and I trek to the library to borrow their word processor so that I can type my scholarship essay. When I finish and bring it home I discover a few spelling errors and, frustrated, I have to return to the library tomorrow.
I finish the day with my evening bike ride, only to be drenched in the pouring rain that, five miles from home, snuck up on me. Fancy my not having a computer to check the weather forecast in my area.
Now I'm in bed with a cold, detailing plans to invent the first computer!

The Long Walk On Short Pier

I'll probably get some flack for this, but oh well.

As my faithful readers know by now, I became pregnant with Lily via artificial insemination by a race of supernatural beings looking for something to do one February night in 2001. Or something along those lines.
Since then, I have bounced back and forth between sympathy and disdain for the sperm donor. Call me crazy, but I thought he'd come back and want to be a decent part of her life when he was ready. When he got another girl pregnant and left her, my eyes began to open. Now that he's left a third baby behind, my cloudy vision is gone.

It has taken me 6 years, many tears, a new and wonderful relationship, several false starts, numerous endings, endless prayers, days of Scripture reading, and several great friends and family members to strengthen me enough so that I can say:
I'm tired of being torn, mistreated, cursed at, coerced, lied to, defeated, and scared.
We have a family, we have a life. We don't need you.
God has a plan for you, but it doesn't involve us.
Through God I am strong. I can end this.
~~~~~~~~
There is a site called PostSecret. It started as one man's community art project and grew into a multinational phenomenon. He set out hundreds of blank postcards all over his town and invited passersby to take one, decorate one side with their darkest secret and mail it to him anonymously. So here is my PostSecret, going in the mail tomorrow.

Short Trip To Heaven

"Mom."
"Yeah."
"I want to see heaven."
"Well, when you get older God will take you to heaven."
"I don't want to wait until I am OLD. I want to go now."
"God gets to decide when you go to heaven, Lily. Not me."
"Mom? How do you get to heaven?"
"You go to heaven when you die."
--pause--
"Mom?"
"Yeah."
"Can you kill me so I can go to heaven and see it?"
"Um, no."
"But why?"
"Because the Bible says you can't kill anyone, and if I do I will go to jail and you will be gone forever."
"No I won't! I'll be right back! I just want to see it for a minute!"
"Lily, when you die you can't come back to life. You stay dead and you stay in heaven."
--pause--
"Please?"
"No Lily. It's just one of those things."
--sigh, ho hum--
Caleb: "Mom?"
"Yeah?"
"Are you gonna kill Sissy?"

History Lesson

Apparently Lily has been learning about Martin Luther King this week.
In Wal-Mart yesterday she overheard on a television something about MLK, to which she very loudly remarked:
"MOM!! I LEARNED ABOUT MARTIN LUTIN KING IN SCHOOL! THE WHITE PEOPLE SHOT HIM AND KILLED HIM BECAUSE THEY DON'T HAVE GOOD MANNERS!!!"
Oy vie.
"MOM, WHY DID THE WHITE PEOPLE KILL MARTIN LUTIN KING?"
Needless to say, we made the quickest exit from a Wal-Mart on record.
This incident reminds me of the time I went to my cousin Lauren's house. She has a wall decorated with her daughter's school work. They had been learning the letter K at some point, as depicted by an artwork that proclaimed:
K K
K
Love those preschoolers.

Waddle Waddle, Quack Quack

Driving aimlessly around town the other afternoon I decided to take the children to the Kiwanis park ("But there aren't any Kiwanis there," as Lily would have you know). Upon parking and opening the car door, we were swarmed by ducks looking for a handout. My kids FREAKED.
"AHHHH! Mom! They're gonna EAT ME!!"
"Make them go away!"
"Ewww, they're UGLY Mom!"
I tried to explain to them that if they would just walk towards them, the ducks would back away. They didn't believe me. Finally I coaxed Lily out of the car and she ran to the playground unharmed. Caleb I had to drag out of the car and plop him in the middle of the ducks, who fled. He stopped crying and watched them run away.
"See, I told you they would go away."
"But they were gonna eat me."
So he goes and plays on the playground for a little while, and I call them back to go home. Of course the ducks are back, preventing the kids from getting to the car.
"Mom!! They're gonna eat me again!!"
"No they're not! Remember? They're gonna run away!"
"No they won't!!"
Lily gets brave and tries to catch a duck, who waddles away. She gets into the car. Caleb is still mortified.
"Caleb! They won't hurt you! They're just ducks!!"
He starts crying again, so I walk through the parted sea of ducks and retrieve my son from the alien ultra scary man-eating ducks.
Now, if they were geese I would have kept driving, but I think they migrate or something. But these ducks have grown up in the park, therefore I knew they weren't going to hurt the kids. Besides, if they did charge or whatever they do, one swift kick would have gotten them away.
I found this episode funny. Lily did too, after a while. Mimi did not. Caleb has forgotten the whole incident and will probably grow up to write a fabulous screenplay about man eating ducks that will make him a millionaire.

Driving Tips For You Idiots

1. If the speed limit in a school zone is 20 m.p.h., I'm going 20 m.p.h.!! Quit honking at me because you're running late!!
2. At a four way stop, the person who gets there first goes first. If two people get there at the same time, the person on the right goes first. If four people arrive at the same time, SOMEONE GO!! It doesn't matter who!! Quit playing chicken!!
3. Get off my bumper. It's really annoying and I WILL brake check you.
4. This is one for the stupids delivering children at the school. Don't walk out in front of a moving vehicle with two children!! I can't count the times an aid has done this and if I hadn't been watching... well, you can guess.
5. If you have your blinker on, please turn somewhere. Anywhere.
6. To the lady going 35 in her Hummer down the main strip: you paid $60K for all that horsepower, use it! Or are you trying to save on gas?
7. If I take longer than 0.2 seconds to gun the gas when the light turns green, don't honk at me or I'll just sit there and make you even more late.
8. If you have a super cool bass system, blare it in your driveway. It impedes my concentration, scares my kids and makes you look stupid.
9. Spinning hubcaps really bother me. I tend to stare at them instead of the road. Spin them in your driveway please.
10. Don't try to pass me when we are both turning left at the same intersection. That's stupid and dangerous.

Those Genes Look Good On You! 3

My dad grew up on a dairy farm in northern Indiana. The area that his family hails from gets pretty freaking cold four months out of the year. I'm talking highs of 30 and lows of 10, with the snowfall levels about 50% more than the national average. Anyway, Dad and Grandpa have always regaled us kids with crazy stories about when they were growing up (remind me to tell you the one about blowing up the gopher hill with dynamite; oh, and the drunken parrot named Pete). Dad has also used these stories to remind us of how lucky we are compared to the hardships he grew up with ("When I was twelve I had to get up at the crack of dawn and break up the ice in the cow troughs with an ax! Now you stop complaining about the car not being warmed up enough to turn the heater on and SUCK IT UP!!").
One of the many stories he told was about a truck he or Grandpa had when he was a teenager that was quite particular about who drove it when and where. One thing this truck absolutely hated was being washed. An occasional rain storm was fine, but if you dared even one soapy drop on its fender, it wouldn't run for days.
I have hair like that.
Once when I was thirteen or so my mom tried to give me a perm. It stayed curly for a whole day and washed out the next. A couple of years later I tried out the big curl over your forehead 'do. It never worked. I either got this horn-ish monstrosity or a hair spray stuck blowout over my brow. The only thing my hair will do is be washed and be brushed. No fancy spritzers here, woman! How dare you!
Anyway, the other day I went and got my haircut. The hairdresser put a little mousse in my hair, blow dried it, and bam! I had, like, a hairdo. I thought cool! Now I can do my hair and show my husband that yes, there is a little bit of femininity left in his wife. So I went to Dollar General and bought a blow dryer, a round brush and some mousse. The next day, I took a shower and recreated the steps I saw the hairdresser perform. Do you know what I got?
Super duper volume. Like, the bottom of my hair sat a full three inches away from my back. Too much mousse? I don't know. But I was tired of fumbling with the blow dryer and trying to brush/curl the ends of my hair at the same time, because everything goes backwards in a mirror and I'd burned myself too many times for it to be funny anymore.
Stupid truck hair.

New Year's Eve 2008

Booze at the liquor store: $58.72

Margarita glasses: $24.99

Bag of ice: $1.92

Having to go to bed at one a.m. because you're getting too old for this s#it: priceless