Screwged

As I posted before, we remodeled our kitchen over the Summer, and drama ensued, because that's who we are. So to my amazement, when we took that project a step further and spent the months of October and November knocking out 2 kitchen walls to create an open floor plan with our living and dining areas as well as laying wood flooring, I had nothing major to report...other than the fact that my Zumba income was paying for this remodel and for 7 weeks, I lived but one stray staple in the foot away from the entire project coming to a screeching halt. But all in all, it went smoothly, until the very end when Lowes (again) couldn't match our paint for touch ups. Every paint we tried was just a shade off and we faced the dreaded task of repainting the entire upstairs living space because there were literally no stopping points. So...we created some stopping points. Look closely and you'll see some random pieces of wood trim. Look too closely and you might see like, 3 different shades of burgundy around our new island.

Guess what? I.Don't.Care.

Having miraculously completed that project by Thanksgiving, Ron thought we should go ahead and tackle the last room on our remodel list. The rec room. He decided on an Ohio State theme, which provided lots of ideas for him for Christmas. He came home with his "charcoal grey" paint, but I looked at the color swatch and said, "That's blue." And he said, "Nuh uh!" and I didn't argue because when a grown man says 'Nuh uh!' he's obviously right. Two hours later, he rolled it on and yelled, "It's bluuuuuue!!!"

 

Nuuuuh uhhhh.

Grey/Blue...Ohio State/Michigan...what's the diff?

 

But with the floor installers scheduled to come Monday, the room was painted blue, and he moved on to ripping up the carpet. Sunday night he asked me if I'd touch up the paint. No problem. He said, "The can is on the outside freezer." What he failed to mention, is that there were TWO cans of blue paint on the outside freezer. I spent the next hour retouching every spot on every wall and then went to bed. The following morning, 10 minutes before the floor installers were scheduled to arrive, I went in the rec room and found this.

What.The.HELLLLLLL????

I immediately sent Ron a picture and he replied, "Did you stir it?"

Did I stir it? Did I STIR it?!? It looks like somebody wiped Cookie Monster's dead rotting carcass all over our rec room walls and you wanna know if I STIRRED it? I think the issue's bigger than that.



 

The floor guys arrived and I had no choice but to take them down to the room where one guy looked at the walls and said, "Wow."

Um, you don't get to say wow to me, SIR!

 

The other guy asked where all the flooring is. I told him the garage. And then he told me they wouldn't be able to lay it for 48 hours, because it's cold and it should've been stored inside.

 

So I stood there deciding which one to punch first and then the 'wow' guy spoke up and offered to bring the wood inside before they left. Apparently my scary vibe was in full throttle.

 

I spent the next 2 hours repainting the entire rec room with the right shade of blue, and for 2 days straight, we ran electric heaters to help warm the wood. So when they arrived this morning, we discovered that the heaters had blown a breaker and our rec room had no electricity. And then the 'it should've been stored inside' guy asked me which direction I wanted the wood to lay and when I told him I'd call my husband and ask, he said, "You can't make that decision yourself?" and then the 'wow' guy said, "You saw what she did to the walls."

 

So nobody wants to make it outta here alive, is that what I'm hearing?

 

They're laying the floors now and I began blogging this in hopes that by doing so, nothing else could possibly go wrong, but then the screen door handle broke, the flooring guys got locked out and the UPS guy showed up with a delivery and thought they were breaking into our house, so screw that plan. Let's just none of us be surprised if there's a Part II to this nightmare.

 

In the meantime, the blue rec room cancelled my ideas for the Ohio State decorations I'd arranged to get my husband for Christmas, so I hatched a secret plan to order him an X-Box...but then after Thanksgiving dinner, all the guys went on a shopping trip together and bought themselves X-Boxes and now this is what my bedroom looks like every evening.

So Merry freakin Christmas to all...

...and to all a good night.





Pardon The Interruption...

Ok, so many of you know I've been writing for the website HaHas for HooHas for 6 months now. When people ask how to find those articles, I tell them to go 'Like' the HaHas for HooHas Facebook page and their posts will come up on the newsfeed. Or, if you're looking for my articles specifically, you can go directly to their site, scroll down, click on my picture and all of my articles will pull up. Easy peasy.

Then I have people ask why I don't post my articles onto this blog site. The answer I give is, I created this blog to document our family stories for our kids (and anyone else who happens to enjoy stupid humor laced with heavy sarcasm), therefore, I keep my work articles separate. And that's true. The other true answer that I don't say out loud is, I'm a socially backward introvert who shudders at the mere suggestion of self-promotion. That being said, this is the nature of the beast in the writing profession.

So I think I've come up with a compromise. (((WARNING))) This is gonna feel and sound a whole lot like self-promotion, so please just let me get through this before I vomit.

I'll continue to keep my private Facebook page and this blog separate from my weekly articles, but I'll 'Share' the articles on this blog's Facebook page, Close Courters Blog. So if you want to go 'Like' that page, that's where you'll be able to track both my personal entries here and my professional entries there.

A few things you should know.
1. It's 6 months worth of weekly articles, and believe it or not, my life goal isn't to annoy the crap out of anyone. So starting today, I'll go back to the beginning and share one per day until I get caught up and then stay on a weekly schedule.

2. I write a different format over there. Rather than specific stories, I write lists...of everything you might've never thought could be made into a list. They're generally quick easy reads and hopefully have you nodding in agreement to a mundane observation, laughing at my reaction to a mundane observation or widening your eyes thinking, 'Holy crap, did she really go there?'
The answer is yes. I'll always go there.

Which brings me to this:
3. If you're easily offended, feel free to steer clear. But if you know my humor, understand what I do, and can simply enjoy a good harmless laugh, have at it.

4. I'm always open to ideas and suggestions for writing material. Feel free to message any thoughts or observations of your own that you think might make a funny article topic and if I use it, I'll credit you on the Facebook page when I share it.

5. I need to give a shout out to my faithful team of proofreaders, who every single week, willingly subject themselves to my writing, openly share their thoughts and ideas, always catch my typos, and freely tell me if something just doesn't make sense or goes too far...too far, psh.
So to you, Susan Y and Melanie G, THANK YOU for putting up with me...and I'm really very sorry.

Alright, that's it. Now if you so choose, you can go 'Like' Close Courters Blog on Facebook and then let's all forget that I just invited anyone to 'Like' my anything. *gag*

Date Fight

Deep in my mind, where peace and order like to reign, I classify my relationships as the rings of the solar system. Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, and Uranus. (Bear with me. This will start to make sense. Or it might not.) With that in mind, the sun for me is God, who is at the center of my "universe" and He is who I ultimately strive to revolve all other relationships around. Therefore, in my little system, Ron, our kids, their spouses and our grandkids would be on the first ring, Mercury. That means, they're the ones who come first in my line of priorities in every single area of life. No ifs, ands or buts.

Venus is reserved for my closest of close friendships. The people who know my story and I know theirs. Those few who are aware of my walls and yet managed to love their way to the other side of them. It's a trust thing. If I trust you, you're on my Venus, and if you're on my Venus, I assure you, you can trust me right back. 

That's not to discount my feelings for everyone on Earth...my ring Earth, not like, Earth Earth. Earth is where all my other friendships are. The people who might not know my story and I probably don't know theirs, but there's a fun companionship and I enjoy our time together. Earth is big, Earth is crowded and Earth is awesome. 

Mars is for acquaintances. It's friendly on Mars, in a surfacy sort of way. 

Jupiter has a giant 'Proceed With Caution' sign. It consists of varying levels of relationships, but trust is hard to come by on Jupiter because Jupiter is untrustworthy. No offense.

Saturn is for strangers and Uranus...well, let's just say I don't spend much energy there.

Again, this is just a loose attempt to simplify a complicated concept. Our lives are an ever evolving system of relationships as people meet, change and grow. We all have different levels of relationships depending on how well we know people, and whether we admit it or not, that often dictates how we prioritize our time and which (if any) battles we're willing to choose. 

That being said, don't ever ever mess with my Mercury or Venus. Those peeps are my tribe.

Now, if Ron thought in terms of a solar system, his would revolve around Saturn, where the strangers dwell. For Ron, Saturn is where it's at. Strangers love Ron and Ron loves strangers. 'Stranger Danger?' Not even a thing in Ron's world.

Which brings us to date nights. Last year, we began incorporating workouts into date night. We started at the gym before going out to dinner. Unfortunately, with the late hour and our limited selection of restaurants in our area, we had only 3 places to choose from; Perkins, Applebees, or Bob Evans.

We started at Perkins. By our 3rd date there, the hostess had taken an extreme liking to my extrovert husband who couldn't seem to NOT make eye contact with her, thus in her mind inviting her over to stand at our table and chat the entire time we ate. Dude, she just jumped from my Saturn to Uranus. We're done here.

Next up, Applebees. Nothing horrible happened there if you don't think completely changing their menu and removing my delicious 350 calorie Parmesan Chicken dish somewhere between our 1st and 2nd date is horrible. Welcome to Uranus, Applebees. 

Bob Evans, here we come. The service there is terrible, which is to say that since they were barely interested in taking our order, they certainly weren't interested in chatting it up with Chuckles and they had a delicious potato crusted flounder for a mere 243 calories. This place is a keeper. Until the week we showed up to a practically vacant restaurant at 9pm and the hostess seated us diagonal from the only other people in there. Seriously?

It was a mom and her 2 kids and the older boy took an immediate interest in me. I avoided eye contact and made a mental note to work on my strangers vibe. (For future reference, my Saturn includes kid strangers too.) As time progressed, he was staring at me so intently that he was actually sitting on the edge of his booth seat. I was halfway through my banana nut bread when he got up and made his way over. I prepared myself for my worst nightmare...this kid was about to touch my banana bread and I was gonna end up on the news. (Add germaphobe to my list of fun qualities.)

But to my horror, shock, dismay, outrage, you name it, as I instinctively pushed my banana bread to the side, he started stomping as hard as he could with both feet all over my super-cool-they-no-longer-make-them-orange-and-black Brooks running shoes. In self defense, I moved my feet further under the table, but he reached his feet as far as they'd go and continued to painfully stomp. That's it, you little Uranus...that's when his mom noticed what was going on, grabbed him and made him stop. She'd just barely begun to apologize when my husband...he who used to live on my Mercury...said, "That's ok! He was just having fun!"
Dammit, man, get your planets in order!

We don't do workout date nights anymore. You can now find us on regular dates, sitting in a secluded corner of any steak house during school hours.

The closest we came to having another situation was last year on our annual trip to Hilton Head Island when we chose to eat dinner at the Ohio State Bar so that Ron could watch the game. The place was packed. Ron dropped me off at the door to get a table while he found a place to park across the street. I walked in armed with my library book. (Hey, I never said I was watching the game). The hostess asked if we'd been there before. No, we have not. She said, "Well we seat family style."  What the crap is family style? "You'll be sitting at a table with other people."

I met Ron outside the front doors. He looked at my face and said, "Oh gosh, what happened?"
On our way back to the van, I began describing this 'Family Style' atrocity and then was rudely interrupted by some guy from Saturn yelling "O-H" which of course my husband was morally obligated to respond "I-O!!" in the middle of my traumatic story. Then another guy yelled, "You're not leavin, are ya?" And Ron said, "No!" and I said, "Yes." And Ron said, "We'll be right back!" And I said, "No, we won't." Heaven forbid we disappoint people we've never seen before and will never see again.

Half hour later, we were seated in a booth at the Wild Wing Cafe. Ron buddied up to our waiter and persuaded him to turn one of the tvs to the Buckeye game and I settled in for an evening of reading and margaritas. At one point, I looked up from my book to see the waiter actually sitting in our booth beside Ron and telling him all about his move to the island and the courses he was studying in college, but I figured as long as Ron didn't allow him to start physically assaulting me, I'd let that one slide.

 

This year in Hilton Head, we ordered in on game days.

He's just too hugely popular on Saturn to take out in public anymore.

Refriger-RAGE-er

As you might've noticed (or maybe you haven't), I'm on a once a month posting schedule here. I assure you, it's not for lack of material, but lack of time. One of these days I'll get to slow down...I think.

I'm a little behind, but hope to catch up on a few of our summer time dramas. So let's start with this one.

The older I get, the more OCD I'm getting. I don't need things "clean" per say, but I do need order. So the long drawn out process of remodeling our kitchen this summer was nothing short of a nightmare for me.

It started with the simple idea of refinishing the cabinets which required everything to be removed from them and stacked around the house. Four days of not knowing if dishes in various rooms of the house were clean or dirty. Awesome.

Cabinets, check.

When everything was put back where it belonged, we realized the cabinets looked so good that the countertops looked like crap. Five weeks and countless fights with Lowes later, our new countertops arrived...aaaaaand everything from the cabinets was removed. Again. And you can't upgrade your countertops without also upgrading your sink. Surprised you didn't know that. Enter 4 days of no countertop, no sink and no running water. And just for fun, picture our old countertop and stainless steel sink piled outside on our driveway because we're the best neighbors to live beside ever.

Countertops, check.

Now let's discuss the line of old paint running across our walls because the new countertop isn't as tall as the old one. There was also a rather large scraped up section from where the countertop was forced down the wall because it hadn't been cut short enough. My fingers were involved, as well as a string of profanity, so let's just skip over that scene, shall we? We'd just painted those walls last year, so back to Lowes again with scraps of chipped paint pieces...mixed with finger skin...for them to match with their super-cool-we-can-match-any-paint-color-machine, until the guy freakin loses my scrap of paint and decides to wing it and I get home to realize it's a shade too dark.

Repaint the entire kitchen, *%#&'ing check.

The kitchen looked amazing until you looked at the old linoleum floor. And if you're gonna change out the flooring, you may as well get a new fridge while you're at it. Adding the old refrigerator into the pile on the driveway earned us yet another Neighbor Of The Year Award. We're fun like that.

So one Tuesday in August, the stove, table, chairs, and dry sink were crammed into our living room and the guy who was laying our tile arrived. Thank you, Lord, an end is in sight...until he left at the end of his first day and said, "I told your husband you can't walk on this for 3 days. "Whoa, wait. What the crap did you just say?"

The floor wouldn't be ready till Friday, which was incidentally the day we expected the arrival of our new refrigerator, which is the one day a week I have massage clients come to the house, and was coincidentally the day we were hosting a get together for Ron's whole side of the family, because of course.

The floors were actually good to go by Thursday evening, so most everything was put back into place by Friday morning. The refrigerator was scheduled for delivery between 8 and noon. My first client was coming at 1 and Ron's family was coming at 6. This should run like clockwork. That is if freakin Lowes knew what clockwork meant.

They didn't arrive until 12:45 and when they dollied the ginormous refrigerator out of their truck I began to wonder how it would fit. Short answer: it didn't.

When my first client arrived, both doors into our house had been completely removed, a refrigerator was in our hallway and Ron and the Lowes guys were discussing the fact that he hadn't measured anything before choosing the fridge, but had "eyeballed it."

(Let's just say that an angry massage therapist is not ideal and I'll be surprised if that client returns.)

When Ron's family arrived for dinner, he was covered head to toe in sawdust from where he had to cut the bottom section from the newly refinished cabinets to squeeze the fridge under and unless you look closely, you can't tell. (Just please don't look closely.)

By the time his family left, so had my rage...until I tried to open the freezer and the kitchen door frame blocked it, which led me to discover that reaching the kitchen light switch was no longer an option, either.

Before I could say anything, he said, "This isn't a big deal...we'll just shorten the countertop again."

Head exploded, check.

In all seriousness, I want to thank my husband for a hard job well done.

The finished product almost makes me forget what we went through to get it.



Actually, no. No, it doesn't.

I'm Sassy and I know it

Right around Mother's Day, Caymen came home from school and said, "We talked about moms today and my teacher said you wear lots of hats. I think she meant daddy because you don't wear any hats." Out of the mouths of babes.

Sadly, I think there was a time when I would've agreed with her.  As a stay at home mom in my 20's, I'm not sure I credited myself with the many hats that job requires. But I proudly wore the titles of wife, mommy, and homemaker, made lots of mistakes, but did the very best job I knew how to do.  So a quick heartfelt shout out to all you mommas out there who wear whichever hat that your husband and/or kiddos need you to wear at any given moment of every single day.  Wear those wrinkled, spit up, peed on hats proud, ladies.  Your children are noticing.  And you'll reap priceless rewards for your sacrifice.

I spent my 30's focusing on my massage therapy career while our 3 children at the time were in school.  But things got a tad complicated when I was 35 and Caymen came along and I suddenly had a baby beside my massage table...or occasionally strapped to my back.  Thankfully she adapted well to spending an hour at a time in a candlelit room listening to soft music, but I was extremely grateful for patient clients who understood that sometimes babies crap their pants at inopportune times.  I was wife, mommy, and massage therapist, made lots of mistakes, but did the very best job I knew how to do.  So a quick heartfelt shout out to all you mommas out there who wear whichever hat required to get through the day juggling life both inside and outside of the home.  Your children are noticing.  And you'll reap priceless rewards for your sacrifice.

I mistakenly assumed hats decreased with age. But I'm almost 44 and accumulating  more hats than I know how to handle. Wife, mommy, writer, massage therapist, zumba instructor, self-doubt-er, suck-er at multi-task-er, easily flustered and full fledged panic attack-er whenever I forget that back in 2012, I made a promise to God.  "Lord, if you open a door, I'll walk through, not because I think I can do it, but because I trust you to equip me to."  I argue with Him a lot and have failed Him countless times, but He has yet to ever fail me. He's kinda super patient like that.

Last November, I got a new hat...Sassy...when Zac's wife gave birth to a 9lb 10oz baby boy who rolled into the world and stole my heart .  This summer I found out I'm going to be Sassy again when Aubrey and her husband have their baby girl in January. By far, of all the hats I've ever worn or wear today, being a Sassy to my children's children is the best of the best. Playing, spoiling, hugging, kissing, reading, rocking, singing...it's all the love you have for your own kids multiplied by infinity. I have no doubt I'll make lots of mistakes, but I'm committed to doing the very best job I know how for the rest of my life.

So a quick heartfelt shout out to all you grandma's...or nanny's, or gi gi's or sassy's...out there. You who unconditionally love, whole heartedly support and happily lay aside all other hats of responsibility you carry at a moment's notice to embrace and fulfill this most valuable privilege as grandparent.

Your children are noticing...and this is your reward.

UhOhs and HooHas

Last fall after a nudge from God (and shove from my husband), I made the decision to resign my Massage Therapist position at the salon, decrease the massage hours in my home office to one day a week and start steering my career into the writing industry full time in 2015.

In January, a friend sent me a link to a site called HaHas for HooHas and encouraged me to submit some stories. (Thank you, JK!) HooHas? You have my attention. So I checked it out, absolutely loved their humor and their content was right up my alley. They were accepting guest submissions, but the part about applying to become a regular writer for the site is what caught my eye. Hey, it's the writing industry. I'm gonna have to hear 1,000 no's before I hear a yes. May as well go for it and get my 1st no out of the way. So I emailed the info they requested, but didn't hear back.

I convinced myself that I probably misunderstood God's nudge toward writing. People would ask how the writing's going. Ummm...gooooood...yeah, goin good. When actually I was quite happy babysitting my grandson 2 days a week and posting on here every so often. So was I scared of the writing or content without it? To be honest, both. See on one hand, I nearly have a breakdown every time I post something here, because I don't trust my ability. On the other hand, I've become so trusting of God that I'm to a place in my life that no matter what it is, if God wants me to have it, He'll see that I get it in His time and if He isn't ready for me to have it, then I don't want it. Therefore, I'm not real great at blindly kicking random doors of opportunity.  BUT, if one cracks open...

In the middle of May, I heard from HooHas. They checked out my blog and asked for a submission that I would write specifically for their site. Now here's where things got a little confusing. I thought it was like a sample that the heads of the site would read. Just them. Which is how I presented it to Ron when I convinced him to let me write 'Roid Rage'...9 Reasons My Husband's Hemorrhoid Pisses Me Off ...that he refused to let me write for my own blog because I average 500 readers. But "go big or go home" I told him and it'd probably only be like 3 people reading it. Ya know. A test piece. So when it went public on May 18th for their 107,000+  readers, my blog site lit up with hits and FB friend requests from complete strangers came pouring in, I got an immediate case of explosive diarrhea knowing I had to call him at work and break the news.
Um, babe? Funny story. You sitting down?

And that kicked off my month long interview process of weekly submissions.

Marital tension aside, I was floating on air. I couldn't stop looking at the climbing number of likes, and shares, and the comments! Holy crap, these people love me!

But the following week I was petrified to submit my 2nd article and voiced my concerns to the site owner. How do I compete with the success of my last post? My husband's hemorrhoid was huge...um, I mean the response. She gave me exactly the advice I needed to hear. Trying to top a successful post is a never ending battle you never win. Some go viral. Some completely bomb. That's just how it goes and I can't worry about it. My job is to keep writing.

So I had permission to fail which was just the boost I needed and the female population at large were hailing me a hero for outing my husband's hemorrhoid, so what could go wrong?  You know the bible verse about the pride and the fall thing?  Yeah, about that...

That night, I woke up with a brilliant idea. (Note to self; nothing brilliant happens at 2am.) A long time ago, I wrote a private list of things that get on my nerves at church and it circulated amongst my innermost friends. They know me well, understood it was all in good fun and according to them, it was hilarious. (All 2 of them thought so). But how do I go public with such a private list and not lose 300 of my FB friends I attend church with in the process? Enter Brilliant Idea #2. Let everyone in on it. Throw it out as a FB status asking them what gets on their nerves and let them write it for me. The best kept secret is the one people think they're in on. And voila, "20 Things That Annoy The Crap Out Of Us At Church" was born.

I was in Hilton Head vacationing with my family when it went public. Within 1 minute of it being published, there were 24 comments. By the 2nd comment referring to me as a pagan, I threw up in my mouth. This was bad. This was reeeeeaaaaal bad. I contacted the site owner. Um, people are taking this way too seriously. Should I explain myself? She said, "No. You should STOP READING THE COMMENTS." I ran downstairs to my family and hysterically announced, "Everyone on the internet hates me!" Zac's response, "Congratulations! You made it!"

I haven't had that many people question my salvation since attending a Baptist church through my teen years. This didn't feel like success to me. My daughter-in-law Barbara gave me a compassionate hug and said, "They just don't know you." My daughter Aubrey immediately went to war defending my honor in the comments section...which I heard about through the grapevine because I haven't read a comment since someone credited a woman like me as being why she's an atheist. Owie. My son-in-law Nick informed me that "There's no such thing as bad publicity." I said, "Jesus might disagree." And then Ron said, "Jesus can defend Himself. Trust me, He's not dependent on you." Well, that's a relief.

And those were just my family members. I received countless texts from all kinds of friends. The outpouring of support was overwhelming.

That night in bed I was talking it through with Ron and wondered if I no longer read comments under my posts, how will I know if people like me or not? And then I heard a word from God inside my head as clearly as if He'd said it out loud. "Are you writing for them or me?" Whoa. Back the pity party up. Is my identity still with God where it belongs or was I placing my worth in the fickle opinions of people again?

And just like that things became crystal clear and another chain of bondage was broken. Since starting my blog here, each time I'd post, my fear would be what if people don't like it? And each time I'd feel God's gentle voice say, 'What if someday I ask you to write something some people will hate?"

I'm not referring to my church post here. I'm neither crediting nor blaming God for that one. I have no idea if He got a chuckle over that list or if He rolled His eyes, smacked his forehead and called an emergency meeting of my guardian angels.

But these things I know for sure:
1. He created me to be exactly who I am and I'm a work in progress. I'll probably disappoint you, but I'm never a disappointment to Him.
2. He gave me the gift to write and the desire to make people laugh. Sometimes it backfires and I piss people off. If that's you, please refer back to #1.
3. I have a testimony. It's not a funny one. Someday, He might ask me to write it. And I'll obey.
4. Aaaaaaaaand, if you're going to a site called HaHas for HooHas for spiritual guidance, you might wanna reevaluate your life, but whatever.

At the beginning of June, I was offered the job and happily accepted. I have yet to read another comment under any of my posts. I certainly hope people enjoy what I write, but it goes back to that saying, 'It's none of my business what people think of me'. God opened this door of opportunity and kept a firm hand on my back as He navigated me through the fear of change He knows I hate, while teaching me priceless lessons along the way. That's so Him. I'm humbly dependent on Him now more than ever as I adjust to a world of weekly deadlines and daily tapping into a source of inspiration that often feels dried up. He has yet to fail me. I wish I could say the same for me, but now I'll refer back to #1.

I've also been reminded how much I have to be grateful for. Turns out, I have way more than 2 people in my inner circle of supportive friends and I have family members who rally tight when one is under attack. I mean seriously, how many husbands out there would sit and quietly read every single despicable thing said about his wife for that rare moment when he can excitedly say, "Hey babe! Here's someone who doesn't hate you!"

Almost makes me feel bad about writing that hemorrhoid thing. Almost.

I'm going to leave you with a quote from Joyce Meyer that I jotted down the week before I heard from HooHas. I discovered it in my phone again the day after the church post heard round the world hit the fan. Maybe there's someone who needs to read this right now. Maybe that someone is you.

"Maybe you need to let go of self hatred and self rejection and being self critical all the time. Maybe you need to realize today that God created you with his own hand in your mother's womb. He gave you your personality. He gave you your talents and your weaknesses. God wants you to be who YOU are and you cannot go to the next level that God has for you until you decide that you're going to be YOURSELF."

~Joyce Meyer~

 

So what's holding you back?

I dare say it's you.



Shark Week

No, I'm not referring to the annual week long special devoted to sharks on the Discovery Channel.  I'm talking about my PMS. 

Our family is fun.  (Some might argue irresponsible, but whatever.)  There are now 9 of us out to have a good time, freely admitting there's minimal adult supervision, and occasionally things go awry.  We're totally used to that and if you've read this blog at all, you are too.  Most of the time, I roll with it.  Occasionally, I get frustrated.  Like, rarely.  I'm talkin hardly ev-er. 

But here's what pisses me off.  When Shark Week unfortunately coincides with our family vacation to Hilton Head Island, where fun is priority #1 and mishaps are at an all-time high, if I happen to ever-so-barely lose my cool, let's everyone stop making eye contact with each other across the room and sure as hell stop with the under-your-breath Jaw's theme song because I'm "putting off a scary vibe."
Duuuh, duh.  Duuuh, duh...Shut it, Chuckles.

So let me break it down for ya and you can draw your own conclusions, because in my opinion, any sane non-pms'ing person would have gotten equally as irritated as I did...

...when someone from Schuler's Bakery came up with the lame-brain idea to make their doughnut boxes taller causing it to not fit on top of the dashboard and 2 hours into our journey came sliding off and scattered our dozen chocolate covered creme-filled dough balls of heaven straight across my crotch and the floor of our van.  If ever the 3 second rule applied, that was it.  "Duuuh, duh."

...when somewhere in North Carolina, my bladder was about to explode and 3, count em THREE, different gas stations told me their bathrooms were "out of order" and I might have flipped the double bird to an entire town.  "Duuuh, duh."

...when I ended up jumping out of the van while we were stopped at a light, ran across 4 lanes of traffic to a McDonald's and straight into the nearest bathroom stall.  Ya know, the one with no toilet paper.  "Duuuh, duh."

...when just half a mile down the highway from that disastrous exit we passed the South Carolina welcome center.  "Duuuh duh..."

...when the morning of our 2nd day, Ron inflated a giant double inter-tube in the middle of our condo living room.  Over top the pull-out couch where our youngest daughter and grandson were laying.  Right beside the table where my full cup of coffee sat.  In my defense, I wasn't the only one screaming that time.  "Duuuh duh..."

...when he finally convinced me to ride the waves on the super fun inter-tube and I heard him yell something about "a good one" and the next thing I knew I'd knocked down 2 little girls and was sitting in the sand with my bikini top around my waist.  No tan lines today, kids.  "Duuuh duh..."

...when Ron lost another hat and pair of sunglasses in the ocean.  Thus bringing his grand total over the course of 17 years of Hilton Head trips to 27 hats and 22 pairs of sunglasses. "Duuuh duh..."

 ...when everyone decided that I would lead our evening bike ride and then no one kept up with me.  "Duuuh duh..."

...when I was taking our annual 'Watch Us Grow' pictures of all of our kids at the playground and a random little girl kept posing herself into the shot.  "Duuuh duh..."

 ...when Ron and I were sitting by the pool one night and Zac called me on the phone and said, "3-2-1..." before using his water balloon launcher to fling tennis balls at us from our 4th floor condo balcony.  "Duuuh duh..."

...when Ron tried to use the "finders keepers" defense over an inflatable beach ball he took from a little girl's dad at the pool.  "Duuuh duh..."

...when we unsuccessfully tried the same defense over the super cool sand hole, complete with carved in bench seats, we found abandoned on the beach one day.  By the time the family who created it returned from lunch, we'd re-designed it to fit our grandson's baby pool, accidentally caved in a bench seat (or 2), and set up our shade tent over the entire thing.  FINE!!!  TAKE YOUR DAMN HOLE BACK!!!
"Duuuh duh..."

 ...when the local ice cream shop "ran out" of large containers, had to put our giant Brownie Feasts in small ones, and then tried to convince us that we're still getting the same serving size.
Oh, nuh uh, Frozen Moo.  You picked the wrong day to mess.
"Duh DUUUUUUHHHH!"

That wasn't just me.

My whole family had my back on that one.