Kirby's run-in with the law

Last week we drove down to Justin's brother Shane's brand new house, arriving there with 2 sleeping boys at 12:30 in the morning. We put Cubby to bed downstairs with Jesse, Mishy, and his cousin Seth, then Justin and I fell asleep upstairs with the baby. At 4:45 in the morning, Seth knocked at our upstairs door saying, "Justin wake up: the cops are here - Kirby got out." We ran downstairs to find Kirby being held by a neighbor as 3 cops asked us why we were terrible parents. Actually, they just asked us what our names were and reassured us that everything was A-OK. Upon figuring out what all had happened (which took visiting the neighbors the next day, interviewing the family, and being far more awake) we pieced together this story:
* Kirby woke up, very confused about his surroundings since he'd never been there before and his parents were nowhere around
* Kirby decided to try the front door for some reason, instead of checking upstairs or waking up his family nearby
* Kirby closed the front door behind him and was outside for who-knows-how-long
* Kirby started crying and immediately two different neighbors woke up and ran outside to find him cold in just his diaper
* Kirby let a woman neighbor hold him in a blanket as her visiting grown son (who just happens to be a Tacoma cop) knocked on nearby doors and the other neighbors drove around the neighborhood searching for an open front door
* Without any sign of us and Kirby not saying anything but, "Where's my Daddy?", the neighbors called the police and they got the story then joined the search
* After knocking on Shane's door and ringing the bell for over 10 minutes (and just before they called CPS to send someone to take the baby home for the night), Seth finally woke up and answered the door to the cops
* We were finally reunited an hour after Kirby started crying outside and only God knows how long after he left the house
So praise Jesus that he was safe and loved the whole time he was a little runaway, but boy-oh-boy could that have been a different experience. I'm just so grateful that I never had to worry. The entire time I knew anything was wrong, it was all in the past and I only had to be glad that he was taken care of.

I love my brother-in-law

Jesse Matthew McNeil is the best brother-in-law ever. He's really handsome and funny and his teeth are straight. He puts the seat down after peeing and he doesn't smell icky. He shaves his chest and drinks his coffee without slurping. I love how he never checks his voicemails. It's hilarious. Best of all, he tells me my blogs are depressing so I love that he inspires me to write nicer stories.

a letter I wrote on Monday

Dear idiot kid in his early 20s who tried to sympathize with me on Sunday about my pregnancy,

You know what, pal? I’ve got a feeling you don’t know what you’re talking about. I wish I’d had longer to talk to you while you were working so hard at your booth at the Taste of Tacoma, but I imagine you must have been exhausted watching people fill up paper cups with 6 ounces of water and I didn’t want to bother you. So please hear me out now.

I was first let on to what sort of brief chat we’d be having after you took one look at me and proclaimed, “Whoa! You’re going to pop any moment, huh?” Young man, I may have but a few years on you, but apparently these are very wise years. Yes, I am at a point in my pregnancy where it is 100% obvious I am pregnant, so I do not have a problem with you acknowledging this. But I have heard so many times in the past month the word “pop” in reference to the hours of grueling labor I am about to endure, that you instantly came across as the sort of guy who has never witnessed or understood the wonders of birth. Please remember this: balloons pop, pregnant women push babies out of themselves. If it was as easy as popping, men would get pregnant too.

Then, when I poured a teeny tiny cup of water, you supposed out loud that I “must be headed to the bathroom like every hour, huh?” Actually, you were wrong. Let me explain why: in the past few weeks my baby has dropped, or moved farther down into the birth canal. This has actually relieved pressure on my bladder, in my case. I can breathe a little easier, I get less heartburn, and I now walk like a drunken cowboy exiting a saloon. When I do have to pee (about every 2 hours, just so you know), I have about a one minute time span to get to the restroom before I go in my pants. Any comments about that? In the future when you see a 9 months-pregnant woman while working the water booth, I would recommend the following phrase instead, “Oh my, you must be tired from walking about the park in your advanced condition on such a hot day. Please take a free bottle of water as a token of my awe for the work you endure on a daily basis in creating a new human.”

Lastly, you seemed very curious about my state, but beyond a man’s normal curiosity. Most men would have offered questions such as, “When are you due?” or “Do you know if it’s a boy or girl?” but you went beyond common tact to A Most Unusual Question that I have not been asked before in either of my pregnancies. “So are you having the baby naturally or did you schedule a C-Section or what?” is by far the strangest thing I’ve ever heard while pregnant. And I’ve had a barefoot stranger woman come grasp my tummy with both hands and insist that he would be a beautiful boy. That was strange. But not as strange as your desire to know my intended method of birth. Perhaps your mother didn’t explain all the basics to you, son, or perhaps you just read Us Weekly too often and think knowing the way a baby comes out is ordinary conversation. Well, my naïve acquaintance, prepare yourself for the full answer to my response, “Natural.” I choose natural childbirth, which is the common term for not having medicine during labor, because I think it is the healthiest option for myself and my son. Also, I value my strong aversion to most drugs and desire to solve most ailments by drinking water and eating better and sleeping more, and I choose not to compromise those values especially while pregnant. But I believe what you were actually asking me was whether or not I was going to have a major surgery. No, I am not going to have a C-Section; in fact I am going to have the baby come headfirst out of my vagina. I was really really kicking myself for not telling you that. (Not literally kicking myself, since of course I can barely lift my swollen feet off the ground, but figuratively there was a lot of kicking going on.)

I am sure that you will understand these things better when you are married someday and your wife is pregnant, but until then you really don’t need to treat pregnant women as freaks. Just make the same casual conversation with them as you would with anyone else: “Hot day, huh?” “Having fun?” “Best water at the fair here.” Okay, bud? Glad we got that clear, and thanks for hearing me out.

Sincerely,
the 9 months-pregnant woman who just wanted a stinking paper cup of water

a guy peed on my bus yesterday

My bus ride from Seattle to Tacoma is about 45 minutes long from the last stop in Seattle to the first stop in Tacoma. At any time in the afternoon, there is a bus no longer than a 10 minute wait to take you there. They come really often. Often enough, that if you had to pee really badly you could get off the bus, go pee, and get on the next bus. As long as you were still in Seattle. Now if you were an Icky Hobo and didn't think that far in advance, then 5 minutes into the freeway part of the ride, you would consider hunkering down on the stairs that sit halfway in the bus, and just pulling out your Icky Hobo penis and peeing on the stairs. Then you wouldn't really worry too badly about 40 minutes more of disgusted other passengers that can't possibly be more eager to get off the bus. Well, that's what happened. Yuck, huh? Some lady starting screaming, "This guy is peeing on the bus!" and some guy standing near the stairs looks over and starts laughing in disbelief. Then some weird dorky guy with a 15 year-old's mustache asked everyone for their newspapers and actually tried to absorb it from the steps. If ever there's a time to not be a hero, it's when there's Icky Hobo pee involved. Just let it be, fella. When we got to the bus station, the man was greeted by a cop and two bus officials...all wearing rubber gloves. I've never been so glad to be home.

New size comparisons for pregnant mamas

I’ve noticed that the method for comparing the baby growing inside you to a common outside object (usually produce) is quite outdated. I mean, honestly how many of us have ever held a Chinese cabbage, and can you really compare a large jicama to a 17-inch long, 3.75 pound human being? No. So I’m offering some suggestions for how to really compare that baby in your body to something external. My original source is from BabyCenter’s information, although most other websites and books have similar food weight/size comparisons. Ridiculous. Starting at 4 weeks (2 weeks from implantation), here are my non-food or more-likely-to-recognize-food comparisons. Mine lean more toward the length side, although I tried to find shape and weight comparisons when available for those sizes.

4 weeks: old comparison – poppy seed; new suggestion – gnat
5 weeks: old comparison – sesame seed; new suggestion – clump of mascara
6 weeks: old comparison – lentil bean; new suggestion – pencil eraser
7 weeks: old comparison – blueberry; new suggestion – Tylenol
8 weeks: old comparison – kidney bean; new suggestion – bumble bee
9 weeks: old comparison – grape; new suggestion – Micro Machines car
10 weeks: old comparison – kumquat; new suggestion – house key
11 weeks: old comparison – fig; new suggestion – contact lens case
12 weeks: old comparison – lime; new suggestion – Hot Wheels car
13 weeks: old comparison – medium shrimp; new suggestion – salt shaker
14 weeks: old comparison – lemon; new suggestion – wadded-up paper towel
15 weeks: old comparison – apple; new suggestion – doorknob
16 weeks: old comparison – avocado; new suggestion – 8 g.b. iPod
17 weeks: old comparison – turnip; new suggestion – Slinky
18 weeks: old comparison – bell pepper; new suggestion – pop-up hairbrush/mirror combo, opened
19 weeks: old comparison – heirloom tomato; new suggestion – soda can
20 weeks: old comparison – banana; new suggestion – TV remote
21 weeks: old comparison – carrot; new suggestion – stapler
22 weeks: old comparison – spaghetti squash; new suggestion – commuter mug
23 weeks: old comparison – large mango; new suggestion – Barbie doll
24 weeks: old comparison – ear of corn; new suggestion – engineering ruler
25 weeks: old comparison – average rutabaga; new suggestion – men’s work boot
26 weeks: old comparison – English hothouse cucumber; new suggestion – half-gallon of milk
27 weeks: old comparison – head of cauliflower; new suggestion – inflated water-wing
28 weeks: old comparison – Chinese cabbage; new suggestion – skein of yarn
29 weeks: old comparison – butternut squash; new suggestion – Zack Morris cell phone, including antenna
30 weeks: old comparison – head of cabbage; new suggestion – mini baseball bat souvenir
31 weeks: old comparison – 4 navel oranges; new suggestion – small pipe wrench
32 weeks: old comparison – large jicama; new suggestion – stuffed animal large fair prize
33 weeks: old comparison – half a pineapple; new suggestion – backpack
34 weeks: old comparison – average cantaloupe; new suggestion – Jenga tower just before crashing
35 weeks: old comparison – honeydew melon; new suggestion – lava lamp
36 weeks: old comparison – Crenshaw melon; new suggestion – car muffler
37 weeks: old comparison – stalk of Swiss chard; new suggestion – foldable umbrella, extended but not opened
38 weeks: old comparison – leek; new suggestion – small potted poinsettia
39 weeks: old comparison – mini watermelon; new suggestion – piñata
40 weeks: old comparison – small pumpkin; new suggestion – toy baby doll

weird hips and legs and lower back when pregnant

So how come whenever I'm pregnant one of my legs grows an inch longer than the other? And if it hasn't, then you explain to me why I'm walking around like Cowboy Barbie whose hips were pulled out of their sockets by some cruel little girl and they're just hanging by that elastic between them. Seriously, I don't have the pregnant waddle, I have the awkward bow-legged one year-old baby mosey/swagger. Ridiculous. Here are all my pregnancy woes (I won't even begin to whine about my stretch marks):
* I'm itchy
* my lower back aches if I sit/lie down in practically any position for longer than 2 minutes
* my tummy is humongous, but my bottom is not, so I look extremely lopsided and I show my butt crack a lot
* I don't have to pee too much more, but when I have to go I need to go instantly or else I swear I'll wet my pants
* my hips ache when I sleep on one side for too long (of course I'm normally a tummy sleeper and that's pretty out of the question)
* I'm a lot flightier than usual and I forget and lose things almost as much as my husband!
* my baby weighs just under 5 pounds, yet I have gained over 25
* I'm getting this gross acid reflux thingie in the middle of the night where I have to get off my achy side, pull up my sagging jammy pants, and waddle downstairs to get some Tums
Aside from those remarkably easy to live with, yet still annoying problems, this has been a superb pregnancy. Frankie is a wild kicking gymnast and I'm convinced he's going to be one of the two best looking kids in the history of the world. #1 being me, of course.

100 Facts about me...almost

So I've been super into this Craftster.com site for the past 6 months and I just joined a craft swap (craft something for some other woman, she crafts something for you, then you mail them to each other) called 100 Facts About Me. Supposedly she's supposed to get some great ideas from what I say for her to craft. Hopefully she will! I thought I'd share them here.
1. I am a Christian.
2. I was married September 4, 2005.
3. My husband’s name is Justin.
4. We have a 2 ½ year-old son Kirby Oren.
5. We will have a baby in early July named Frank (we’re up-in-arms about the middle name).
6. My favorite color in the whole wide world is robin’s egg blue.
7. I have 5 tattoos – 4 for my Christianity and 1 for my Scottish heritage.
8. My 3 favorite movies are Indiana Jones & the Last Crusade, King Kong, and Star Wars.
9. My 3 favorite songs are My Kinda Lover, Moneytalks, and Tracks of my Tears.
10. My 3 favorite books are Of Mice and Men, Lord of the Flies, and Spoonriver Anthology.
11. My 3 favorite authors are O. Henry, Roald Dahl, and C.S. Lewis.
12. I love Golden Grahams and Basic 4.
13. When I’m rich I’m going to have a lagoon in my backyard with a pirate ship in the middle.
14. I love to bake desserts.
15. Halloween is my favorite holiday and I love costumes.
16. I think Disneyland is the greatest place ever.
17. I know Tacoma is the best city in the world.
18. I’m casual about everything except I won’t wear jeans that aren’t Citizens or Sevens.
19. I am half-Puerto Rican.
20. I went to school for Construction Management.
21. My dream job is to be a Foley artist.
22. I do not take drugs except for allergy pills. I hate most medications.
23. We just bought a chicken coop and we’ll be having chickens soon.
24. I always buy ice cream from the ice cream man and lemonade from a kid’s stand.
25. I can play most percussion instruments.
26. My favorite donuts are chocolate-chocolate and toasted coconut.
27. I love to plan parties.
28. I’m going to have trouble coming up with 72 more items.
29. My husband and I dated for just 6 months before marriage.
30. I am resourceful.
31. I like my son’s kids shows like Flapjack and Bunnytown…a lot.
32. My favorite foods are Beef Wellington and ambrosia.
33. I LOVE root beer. I’ll take it over alcohol any day.
34. I like dancing a lot.
35. I’m super into movies and I love them for their entertainment value (Commando’s great, but The English Patient was horrible).
36. My dream car is a turquoise ’57 Chevy Bel-Air.
37. The best date I went on was to Cirque du Soleil’s Zumanity in Vegas with my husband.
38. I can’t stand obnoxious noises.
39. I love the smell of my Dior Hypnotic Poison perfume.
40. My shoelaces never stay tied.
41. I can be very impatient.
42. I adore the Fred company and all their silly products.
43. I love the O. Henry story The Ransom of Red Chief, mainly because of the line “welterweight cinnamon bear.”
44. If I got married today I would have had a picnic reception at the park. I didn’t think of that in time.
45. I get to see movies for free still at the theater I worked at over 5 years ago.
46. Once I saw the Easter Bunny for reals. I was like 6 or 7.
47. I think navy blue and grey are boring colors.
48. I don’t like the wind.
49. If I pray to find something I always find it immediately.
50. The last concert I went to was New Kids. The one before that was Spice Girls. I’m going to AC/DC in a few months.
51. I gave birth to my last son naturally. I like that. Except for the sucky labor pain part.
52. I have a really great idea to make Pre-Natal Ice Cream, but no ice cream distributors will cut me a break.
53. My son Kirby is going to be the first man on Mars.
54. We love entertaining and have people over for dinner at least once a week.
55. I never fold my clothes.
56. I hate poop. My dear husband changes almost every poopy diaper.
57. We want 5 kids, but we are going to adopt our last 2 from the foster system.
58. I got scammed last month for $336. That sucked a lot.
59. My husband is a teacher. So is my mom, my uncle, my aunt, my grandpa, etc. I’m the only one in my family without a Master’s in fact, and I have no plans to go back to school ever.
60. The best party I threw was my 25th birthday: Forrest Gump in Eat-O-Vision. I served all the food on the screen.
61. I have a women’s group called Tacoma Ladies’ Club (TLC) and we get together and hang out somewhere in Tacoma once a month.
62. I don’t like to run.
63. I hate throwing up and I avoid it at all costs.
64. I get distracted easily.
65. I’m a great driver and have never gotten a ticket.
66. I like to make mugboards for parties (the scenes with cutouts for people’s heads).
67. My wedding was the greatest day of my life.
68. I adore the painting Off the Dutch Coast by James McNeill Whistler.
69. I think ray guns are cool.
70. When I’m not pregnant I want to try that P90X workout thingie.
71. On my 80th birthday I’m going to smoke a pipe and get a tattoo of my husband’s name.
72. I love giving gifts.
73. I think Johnny’s seasoning salt is extraordinary.
74. I don’t read my Bible nearly enough.
75. My husband and I like chaperoning his high school’s dances. The kids are terrible!
76. I think the Loch Ness monster is interesting.
77. I love retro (‘50s/’60s) kitchen things.
78. I would like stuffed animals of food, a dinosaur, a monster, Chewbacca, R2D2 or C-3PO for my son.
79. I’ve always liked pirates – even back when it wasn’t trendy.
80. I would like a stamp of our address (McNeil • 3516 N. Stevens St. • Tacoma, WA 98407)
81. I crafted a lot in grade and middle school, but I only started again recently. I just sewed my first apron ever!
82. I like pearls.
83. I’m really having a hard time here!
84. I don’t believe in horoscopes, fortune telling, etc.
85. I’ve never been drunk.
86. My favorite animals are hummingbirds, flamingos, and giraffes, but I own nothing with any of them on it.
87. I like summer a lot.
88. My lips and hands chap a lot.
89. When I’m rich I’m also going to have a photo booth at our house. I like those.
90. I like real wooden pencils a lot more than the mechanical ones.
91. My 2 favorite TV shows are Pushing Daisies and MacGyver.
92. I got my first kiss when I was 17. He was super cute, but he dumped me because I wouldn’t let him touch my boobs. Bummer!
93. I like food a lot.
94. I used to collect antique Coca-Cola stuff and I still have a ton of it.
95. My favorite craft to make is things out of my Dipity-Glas acrylic film resin stuff.
96. People say I look like Anne Hathaway, but with an up-turned nose.
97. I rarely buy things that aren’t on sale or that I don’t have a coupon for.
98. I make everybody recycle.
99. I’m going to be done now.

(I thought of 100. later: I really wish I had freckles. My favorite freckles in the world are on my friend Dejah's 11 year-old son and Morgan Freeman. I seriously pray like once a week that Jesus will give my children freckles.)

Advice for an 18 year-old

I haven't posted in nearly a year, I know. But I was pretty proud of all the advice I could round up for giving an 18 year-old. I'm not sure about college or future plans, so it's a little generic, but I still like it. Any other advisors for what everyone should know at 18?
Never put an earthly man above yourself. Be nice to those who hurt or ignore you. Pursue your goals confidently but with caution. Be wise with your money so you can splurge once in a while. Be a lady: don't smoke, don't get drunk, and don't swear. Your manners and politeness will reflect well onto everyone who meets you. Begin your studies and work as soon as you are assigned it; you will avoid a lot of last-minute scrambles. Hold on tightly to those you love, even if they drive you crazy. Try new foods. Seriously, don't waste time worrying about your looks, especially since you are beautiful. Beware of lust, though - it's the most prominently accepted sin in the natural world, with the worst consequences. Don't be afraid or anxious about difficult things; take a break, figure out a way to accomplish them, and do it. Work hard and don't be ashamed of minimum-wage jobs. Real friends don't need to cling to drama for relationships. If you think you're hungry or if you're feeling sick, try drinking a glass of water before eating or medicating. If you still feel sick, take a nap. Don't loan anything that you expect to get back. Get in the habit of exercising now. Don't just "try" things - either do them or don't do them, and always make good on your promises. Read your books. And know that above all things, life will just keep getting better if you are obedient to the Lord.

Well, now that I'm back in the saddle...

...how about a little commentary about a Seattle greaseball?
Twice I've seen this guy as I walk through this breezeway in between buildings of the shady Seattle Design Center. They've got these three poster windows up, but no posters in them, so they just frame the brick wall behind them and reflect like lousy mirrors. Well this guy stands there combing his greasy mullet in the makeshift mirrors, and occasionally taking sips of his Sparks alcoholic energy drink. At 6:45 in the morning. Yikes!

Summer Rain and Hot Asphalt

I love the smell of summer rain on hot asphalt.
How beautiful a mixture
of old and new
of cold and warmth
of nature and man
of light and dark
of purity and filth.
There is nothing similar in God's entire Earth.

Phrases I Like

"Hit the ground running" and "Not one thin dime." I really like those phrases. I wish I had more opportunity to use them, but I've got to get back to work since my purse has not one thin dime in it, and I really need to hit the ground running since I have half an hour left of work and one-hour's worth to do.

Six-word Memoirs

I just read about a book called Not Quite What I Was Planning - a collection of six-word memoirs (written autobiographically). Here are some of my favorites before I attempt my own:

Seventy years, few tears, hairy ears.
Catholic school backfired. Sin is in!
Born in the desert, still thirsty.
And now it's my turn:
Loves: God, husband, baby, myself, Tacoma.
Once I'm dead it could be accurately changed to "Loved" and "children." I toyed with
Thank God for everything I’ve had. 25 and far left to go. I really really really like life.
but none of those captured anything specific. After Tacoma would be friends & family, I guess, but I'll have to save that for 8-word memoirs. What would yours be?

Writing Prompt #2: Best Prank Ever

The fifteen or so seventh-grade girls only haphazardly watched Interview with a Vampire. It was 1996 and they were way more interested in Brad Renfro or Jared Leto than Tom Cruise. Besides, it was kind-of boring. Alaina’s birthday sleepover was proving to be much more fun by pulling pranks on people or making sickeningly sweet sundaes. These more interesting pastimes resulted in the chaotic manner for watching the video, and only the few girls who were really into the storyline stayed undistracted. Thus when the movie finally ended (finally), the more adventurous girls rejoiced in an opportunity to spice up the slumber party by playing light-as-a-feather-stiff-as-a-board. And of course since the game never works, they quickly abandoned it for Ouija. Now until this point, the pranks had been mostly age-appropriate juvenilities: bras worn as hats, stealing the ice cream scoop, et cetera. But Alaina led two other mischievous rascals to help develop a much better plan – one that would combine all the activities of the birthday party until that point. One scoundrel proceeded to dominate the Ouija board’s planchette to form a rigged message, another rogue mixed strawberry syrup and red food coloring in a glass of water, and a third troublemaker replaced an identical glass of water with the blood-like mixture on the sly. By the time the pointer had indicated to LOOK IN AVIVA’S CUP no one was anywhere near it and every girl was playing Ouija, as though none had never left the room. Of course Aviva was one of the girls who had been really into the movie and she had already relayed the story of how she had gotten her blood drawn earlier that day, so her extremely genuine screams set off the other ‘fraidy cats who truly believed that was indeed Aviva’s blood in her water glass. When the birthday girl and her two cronies fell to the floor laughing, the jig was up and they had to confess to their deviousness. But never before the slumber party of ’96 had the timing and the mark been so perfectly matched, and never will they again.

Writing Prompt #1: Worst Meal Ever (in second person again!)

It’s Thanksgiving in your thirteenth year and you can’t enjoy your meal. You just got your braces on this Tuesday and your jaw sorely aches with every bite. Your pathetic attempts to chew the meat remind you of when that mountain of a kid Zion gave you a gum eraser in the third grade and told you it was real gum. Even the tiniest nibbles are like gnawing on a Michelin. But to top that off you have a cold. A bad one. The kind where you try to close your mouth so you don’t look like the billy goats Gruff’s troll, but you just end up gasping for breath every time. Your sense of smell left you ages ago and you are left with but five tastes: bland, flavorless, insipid, plain, and ordinary. The squishy cranberries taste like balls of bath oil, the mushy green beans might as well be overcooked slivers of drywall, and the soggy potatoes insist that they are papier-mâché props. You reach for the slimmer-than-usual celeries only to discover with your earnest (and painful) crunch that they are actually green onions and somehow your taste buds have suddenly kicked into action with a burning hatred. This is so far not to mention the fact that your pain medication leaves you desperately thirsty and no amount of refreshing water or sparkling cider is keeping you quenched. Your aunt brings out her homemade apple pie a la mode and you almost cry in anticipation of the dullness in both flavor and aching that awaits you. But you are surprised – sure the pie is apparently made from Saltine crackers and lemon juice, but the vanilla ice cream is perfectly cool as you delight in the sweetness that one kind taste bud has allotted you. With no chewing involved, that ice cream eases your sore mouth, soothes your dry throat, and raises your spirits as though you had been feasting all along. Ahhh…thank God for ice cream.

Spam for porn

Justin and I love to compare the subject lines of our spam for porn that we get in our email accounts, (I'll keep this PG and not mention the specific ones that make me laugh the most) but I just was about to empty my spam folder again when I saw the most unimaginative one of all: The person's physical appearance turned me on. Wow. Excitement City. If I had been a man, then never would I have wanted more to please a lady than after I saw that subject line. Forget all the throbbing, scream-inducing, all-nighter promises of other ED pills - these guys promise that a "person" with a "physical appearance" can turn you on. Hot. I think I just might use that kind of naughty bedroom talk the next time my husband has a physical appearance.

Forrest Gump in Eat-o-Vision party

Well my 25th birthday is tomorrow and I thought I'd share how my party went. I called it Forrest Gump in Eat-o-Vision and it was a blast! I got the idea when I read an article about how Smell-o-vision is making a comeback and they were doing it to Charlie & the Chocolate Factory. So I thought it'd be fun to do that only with food, but then I thought people might get sick of all the Wonka sweets, and I decided to watch Forrest Gump and serve the food onscreen. It went pretty much exactly as I planned. There was a hang-up with the TV (if any of you ever makes a TV please please make it work with all its functions even if the remote is lost), but after Justin found where Kirby had stashed the remote (in the china hutch, of course) and we served a couple foods out of order, we got the movie started and it all went well. We served the following:

• a box of chocolates (for the opening parkbench scene)
• popcorn (for the cornfield praying scene)
• Dr. Pepper (for the meeting Pres. Kennedy with the football team scene)
• shrimp (for the scene where Bubba describes all the different shrimps)
• chicken breasts (which I referred to as "shrimpless chicken" and lumped in with the shrimp scene, but one clever partygoer noted could have been referring to Jenny's breasts when Forrest ruins her roommate's bathrobe)
• ice cream ("The only good part about getting shot in the buttocks is the ice cream!")
• snap peas & carrot sticks with ranch dip (for after Forrest reconnects with hippie Jenny)
• wine (for when Lt. Dan is hanging out with Forrest on New Year's Eve)
• apple slices (for the "some kind of fruit company" part)
• coffee (for when Jenny is waitressing as Forrest runs)
• a parkbench cake

I would have also added tea & toast for when Jenny is sick (not from a cough due to cold) and I toyed with serving chocolate pudding for when "..it" happens as Forrest runs, but thought that might be too icky. It was way fun, though, and I think I'll do another similar housewarming party for when Justin and I are moved into our new house in Tacoma. Hopefully it could be a showing of Elf and we could serve hot cocoa and cookies and milk and coffee and spaghetti with syrup, etc. and then at the end have Santa come and give everyone candy canes. Fun! But first I'm planning my friend Marilyn's 35th birthday party as An Early '90s Prom. We'll play only music that would have been played at a prom from 1990-1993, take cheesy photos with a tacky backdrop (any ideas?), and vote for the queen & king. I love parties!!!

PS If you haven't seen my MySpace yet, I got my birthday tattoo after all, plus friends were super generous about cards and gifts this birthday. I got lovely flowers from 3 different people, a Target gift card, a super cute rocker-chic spa set, a case of Thomas Kemper (my friends know me well!), a CD, a lovely silver and amethyst bracelet, a handmade tea spoon plus chai & cocoa, a bar of dark chocolate (yum!), a bottle of wine (which I used for the Lt. Dan part), a bag set and a hilarious magnet, some disposable bowls for ice cream since I forgot to buy them for the party, and my dream purse from Dreamsville. I haven't gotten that many presents since probably my sweet sixteen. 25 rocks!!

My hitchhikers

In total I have picked up 9 hitchhikers. Some were interesting; others were not. I have never picked up anyone that I felt unsafe around and I have never had a problem.

I picked up my first hitchhiker when I was 17 or 18. I was driving late at night down by Stadium and this 40-something dolled-up lady just started flagging me down all manic-like, so I stopped and let her in. Remember in the Stones song "Honky Tonk Women" when he calls the woman a gin-soaked barroom queen? Well that's what this lady smelled like, but she must have known it because she took a bath in Obsession or something right before she left her pub and, oy, her scent was overwhelming. She explained that her car broke down, she needed a ride to Knapp's, she would have walked except two guys had been on the street right behind her (when she got into her frenzy as I drove by), and upon finding out that I went to the same high school as a few kids she knew she proceeded to tell me that she was a church administrator and God bless me. I guess even Christians get drunk sometimes, huh?
My next one was soon after and he wasn't really hitching. I was driving over the spider web bridge very unusally because I had some kind of appointment and was a couple hours late for school. I saw a car broken down on the side, and then about a quarter mile up I saw a very fat man waddle-running as fast as he could. When I picked him up he was so glad and gracious - it turned out he was a lawyer on his way to court and was almost late. He gave me his card and asked me to call him if I was ever in a bind, but I'm pretty sure I'd pay the extra money for someone a bit more reliable.
My third wasn't asking for a ride either, but she was boring. She was some punk kid walking so unsafely along Highway 16 over the Nalley Valley at like midnight on her way to her boyfriend's to probably do drugs and fight. She made no small talk and never said thanks, so I punished her by playing Oldies the whole way there.
Then in college I was driving my mom's Mustang convertible on a perfect day because my car was in the shop. I had just finished a boat ride on Lake Washington with a rich friend (this was the same day I discovered that Citizens jeans are the greatest ever - apparently rich friends have more rich friends) and this guy and girl were hitching a ride to Portland. They kept saying this was by far the best car to be picked up in and we all talked the whole way there (it was I-5 on a Friday afternoon, so traffic was slow enough that we could hear each other in a convertible on the freeway). I even exchanged e-mails with the guy for awhile, but after hearing about his Burning Man adventures a couple times, I figured we probably didn't have enough in common to become best friends.
The sixth person I gave a ride to was some crazy hippie guy whose car ran out of gas when he went up a hill even though he knew he had enough to make it to the station. Justin and Mish were in the car too, and the guy told us how he had a few albums out from the '70s and he used to tour with different bands and how if the f-ing hill wasn't there then he wouldn't have had to f-ing bother us. He was a blast to transport.
Then after I got pregnant and was driving from a prenatal visit I picked up a guy and his girlfriend and took them to a bar. She explained that she had just wanted to take the bus, but he explained they'd get there much faster by hitchhiking. I never knew it was such a convenience for some people! Then after some chit-chatting he let me know that while her other kid was at home (with God knows who), she was also pregnant. I made sure to remind her not to drink. Sigh. Some people are still so ignorant about drinking while pregnant. Let me take this moment to tell you all: Fetal Alcohol Syndrome is proven. You do not have to get drunk for your child to get it. You do not have to drink every day for your child to get it. You could have one drink one time during pregnancy and your child could be learning-delayed or brain-damaged for the rest of his life. Be responsible. And don't give me crud about it being your body so you can do what you want. It's not your body I care about - it's your baby's. Thank you.
Finally a couple months ago Justin and I picked up some Mexican guy who must have been tripping hard because he had no idea what was going on. All he told Justin was that he needed to get to Bellingham. We dropped him off in a safer place just a few miles up since he was actually walking along the non-shoulder 2-foot section of the freeway, but he wandered off like aliens had erased his memories or something. And you know what? Justin saw him the next morning still standing in the same area. Weird.

I've never hitchhiked and I probably never will, but I really don't think it's so bad. I've also never seen any of those scary hitchhiking movies, though.

My attempt at a short story

It's no O. Henry or Roald Dahl, but may I present to you my first short story since sophomore year of high school? Pretty please? Well here it is:

The Man Whom Nothing Ever Happened To
a completely un-exhilarating story in second person

(I know the title isn't grammatically correct but I think it sounds pompous to say "The Man To Whom Nothing Ever Happened")

You knew this guy named Dale and nothing ever happened to him. Remember how he wore tapered blue jeans and flannel shirts like he still thought it was 1993? You couldn’t stand that. You kept wanting to say to him, “Hey, Dale, why don’t you try bootcuts or carpenters with a t-shirt once in a while?” but he was a quiet guy so you didn’t want to hurt his feelings. Besides, it wasn’t like he could afford a whole new wardrobe or anything – he wasn’t winning the lotto any time soon, since nothing ever happened to him. You knew he had a job because whenever you saw him Thursday nights at the Denny’s on 64th he was driving his work van, plus he never ditched out on the bill. But he also never splurged on pie for dessert, so although the money was there, there just wasn’t much of it. You, on the other hand, sometimes even ordered a milkshake. Once you got daring enough to order a Coke during dinner and a milkshake for dessert, but you had to pay for that later with 100 crunches and a 10 minute jog around your neighborhood. You saw Dale didn’t wear a wedding ring, so when you were seated next to him one day you asked him why he never brought his wife out to dinner. He looked up at you as though he’d never wanted to get up the courage to talk with you before and said, “Don’t have one,” then went back to eating his dinner waffle. Of course he wasn’t married – nothing ever happened to him. Then that next Thursday you purposely sat next to him and struck up a conversation about how you were going to go out dancing that weekend and would he like to go along, but he politely refused you. Remember that? You were so sure that you could break his habits, but he told you that he just liked to watch MacGyver reruns with his dog on Friday nights. So you suggested Saturday, but he had to wash his hair. After he left abruptly you mused that perhaps nothing ever happened to him because he never did anything. To be fair, though, it wasn’t actually true that you were going dancing – how could you without a partner? You weren’t going to get stuck with some giant greaseball who last applied deodorant in November. But if Dale would have come along then you could have found somewhere to dance. Determined to change him, you ran out to your car (you had already paid the bill) and set out to follow him. What were you going to do if you caught up with him? He was leaning up against his van, smoking a cigarette and he saw you running out right away. You couldn’t play it off like you were late for something because earlier in the conversation you admitted that you weren’t doing anything that night, so you had to say something. “Hey – I didn’t catch your name,” you declared. That’s when you found out his name was Dale, but he didn’t ask for yours. He never came back to Denny’s after that. So what? Nothing ever happened to him so why should you care? Maybe nothing ever happened to you, but at least you updated your wardrobe and ordered a milkshake every once in a while, right? And you’ll go dancing tomorrow night, with or without a partner.

The Funniest Part About Being a Mom

The title of this blog was the challenge for my Writer's Group that I decided to take on. It was either this or Something I Had to Overcome, and about the only thing that I've ever had to overcome is being gawky so I figured I write more about what I know. So the funniest part about being a mom is what I'll write about. Indeed, I will write about the funniest part about being a mom. Okay enough dilly-dallying. Here are my favorite parts about being a mom, and maybe something funny will pop up there.
Justin called me this morning and told me how Kirby had reached up onto the table to steal a cookie while Justin was loading the car, so when he came back Kirby was sitting on the step to the dining room, kicking his legs and smacking on the cookie. That made me laugh a lot, but I had nothing to do with that except for that I was the one who made the cookies.
Now lately Kirby has been cracking me up because he has intonation and syllables down pat, but he still doesn't know words, so he has little conversations with himself or talks to us in this hilarious Gibberish language. That's funny, but again as a mom I've done nothing.
I've gone to work with baby kisses (mashed-on, day-old food) smeared on my jackets and pant legs quite a few times recently. Everyone else thinks that's funny.
Sheesh. I am terrible about this. I promised that given a prompt, I would be able to write easily. I've always adored the author Roald Dahl, but lately O. Henry is moving in as my favorite. His short stories are just brilliant, and I think I'd love to be that clever. Listen to this line "That boy put up a fight like a welter-weight cinnamon bear" - is that genius, or what? What imagery! What superb weaving of words! Remember in stupid Donnie Darko when Drew Barrymore blabbed about how "cellar door" was the most beautiful phrase in the English language? Well apparently she'd never heard the phrase "welter-weight cinnamon bear," although the climax of the movie may not have been as exciting if she had. Anway, it's not too funny being a mom, but babies are funny at least. Maybe I'll try for How I Overcame My Gawkiness after all.

Shopping at the Outlet Malls

Justin and I took the baby and went shopping at the outlet malls in Tulalip yesterday for their Giant Presidents Day Sale!! This meant that there were a couple better deals than usual, but for the most part there were just a lot more Canadians (a Canadian lady informed me in my office that it was also Family Day in Canada yesterday - a.k.a. "Shop in the USA Day Since our Dollar Stinks Right Now and Tax is Still a Lot Less"). These are my observations from the trip.
* If a stroller made for one child has a squeaky wheel that will drive me half crazy because I can hear it throughout half of a giant crowded store, then a stroller made for two children that has a squeaky wheel will drive me fully crazy because I can hear it throughout the entire store.
* When rich young women see photos of Trends in Trendy Magazines they will proceed to purchase every item on that page so that we will all know just how Trendy are, despite the fact that they may end up wearing the skin-tightest sprayed-on leggings shoved into riding boots that actually call for a decent Christian wife to request that her husband looks at the Trendy Woman's Bottom to agree that it looks ridiculous.
* I can see a nice lotion/body wash/candle set and dismiss it as a normal price (and therefore not a good deal) when it costs $9.99 regularly, but when it's been discounted down from $99.99 (I kid you not, in case you too didn't believe that a bathroom goodies set could possibly cost that much) suddenly I find the $10 price an incredible amazing deal even if I have never heard of the brand before that day.
* I'm a sucker for anything with cute little whales blowing out perfect spouts of water and smiling on it.
* God doesn't answer selfish prayers for the $50 purse to be marked down to $30 when He knows that you have a perfectly good purse at home even if it isn't The Greatest Purse Ever and you are certain that you need it.
* Canadian drivers don't believe in signaling, not cutting you off, going the speed limit, or stopping for stop signs when they are in the US.
* My son really is the cutest baby ever. Even if another baby has a sweet cherub face or dimpled cheeks or bright blue eyes, no other baby has the expression or personality that he has. Thank God for my ham of a baby.