Category Archives: random

Because No Mother Should Miss Her Son’s Graduation From Marine Corps Boot Camp. (Updated!)

Fourteen.

That is the number of days left until I get to see my son’s sweet face for the first time since May 1st. Sadness of his absence has been replaced with excitement and pride. In just two weeks, I’ll be able to wrap my arms around my son, hold him close, tell him how proud I am of what he’s accomplished.

One of the places that I’ve found support during this journey is a support group for Marine parents online. I’ve connected and bonded with parents from my son’s platoon. The past few months, those message boards have been filled with sadness and many messages of the “I miss my son. I’m so sad” variety. The past few days have been filled with nothing but excitement from the others there. “Only 16 more days! We’ll be seeing our Marines soon! The end is almost here! Woooooo!”

Last night

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, in the midst of all of the celebratory-type postings, I found out one of the parents will not be attending the graduation. She’s deeply hurt. When the other parents saw her message, they begin offering to find her son on graduation day and let him call her from their cell phones, or to take pictures of her son so she could see him on graduation day.

I felt sick to my stomach for her and for her son. I can’t even begin to imagine not being able to attend my son’s graduation. I can’t begin to imagine how awful it would be for my son to not have any family there.

I posted this message on Facebook last night:

I just found out one of the mom’s in my son’s company won’t be able to make her son’s graduation because of money. I feel pretty devastated for her. I can’t even imagine not being able to watch my son graduate from boot camp. 🙁

And because my friends are often, they begin asking how much she money would she need? Could they help? Could I set up a chipin page and ask for donations?

(I love my friends.)

I emailed this woman and asked her if she couldn’t go because she didn’t have the money or because she couldn’t get the time off of work? I said “if I could raise money for you, would you be able to travel.” She wrote back and said she absolutely could travel, she just didn’t have the funds. She told me she had tried to raise money online, but no one was willing to help her. Then she said “if you could make this happen, I will kiss you forever.”

I responded that I have amazing, kind, generous friends and that I would see what I could do for her.

I researched flights from her area and hotels and I do believe $1,200 should easily cover her expenses. If you are able to help, please click below and donate what you can. If you can’t help, please just spread the word. Let’s make sure that this mother can hug her Marine on August 10th.

Thanks in advance. You guys are the best. xoxo

You guys are AMAZING. You donated just under the amount I had set as the goal. And with that, I was able to purchase her plane ticket and reserve her hotel room. I have closed the donations since everything is now paid for. Melissa is OVERWHELMED by your kindness. She asked me to thank you. She’s beyond grateful for your generosity. I told her my friends online were amazing, now she believes me.

THANK YOU XOXOXOXOXOXO

This Is Pretty Much Exactly Like Oprah’s Favorite Things.

**And the winner is**
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Ambrosia. 🙂
(check your email, lady)
(Disclaimer: This item was not given to me for a giveaway, I will purchase with my own money.)
There is a perfume that I love so very much.
I get compliments every single time I wear it. Usually, people will say something like “Something smells so good. What is it? Is it cookies? Is it caramel? Mmmm.”
And I hate to be all “it’s me!” But, I know it’s my perfume, so I’ll smile and say something like “I think it’s my perfume” and I’ll let the hot guy, err, I mean precious old lady smell my wrist and he..I mean SHE! will be like “Oh, yeah, that’s it. Yum.”
Last week, I was going to give away a bottle of My Favorite Perfume, but then I noticed that Metalia was giving away a bottle of perfume on her blog and so of course, I had to email her right away because HOW WEIRD IS THAT?
Subject line: This is so crazy!

So, there is a perfume that I love so much and today I was buying a new one on sephora and I was all “I’m going to give a bottle of this away on my blog!” and I wrote a post about how I get compliments every where I go with this perfume and I put it in draft. Fast forward to RIGHT NOW, when I went to your blog and was all OHASHAHHADSHFALHDLHA;LDHFALKHS;HA;LSA NO EFFING WAY!!!!!!!!!!!!
I’m totally tripping out about this because I swear on everything in my life that I had no idea you were doing a perfume giveaway.
THIS SHIT IS SMANGING*

Luckily she is super cool and was all “do the giveaway anyway! We are both awesome perfume gifters!” So, I’m going to do the giveaway EVEN THOUGH she thought of it first. That kind of makes me an asshole, but I have her blessing!
All you have to do to enter is leave a comment on this post and I will choose a winner at random to win a bottle of Pink Sugar by Auqolina.
I’ll close the comments on Sunday, December 5th and announce the winner on Monday.
Good luck!
Comments Closed. Will choose a winner soon. 🙂

Look Who Just Walked Through Our Front Door and Into My Heart

PigHunter walked through the front door with a card and a beautiful bouquet of flowers.
“Happy anniversary, baby.” He said as he kissed my forehead. “20 years, can you believe it?”
We stood there, gazing lovingly into one another’s eyes.
Then, the weirdest thing happened.
I looked down and there was the most adorable dog standing at my feet, looking up at me. Me and PigHunter looked at each other, confused because is that really a dog looking at us and where the eff did he come from?

I looked over and realized the front door was wide open.
The dog started walking all over the house, as if he had been here before.
A liiiiiiiiittle part of me was like “It’s an Anniversary Miracle!” But the rest of me was like “first thing tomorrow morning I will put up signs and also find out if he has a chip so we can get him back to his owner. But if we can’t find his owner, HE IS ALL MINE FOREVER IN MY HEART OMG! PRECIOUS DOGGY!
doggie

Another Excuse to Avoid Writing About My “Feelings”- A Giveaway!

This morning, I was going to sit down and write.
It’s been a while. And there are reasons. Reasons I’ve not wanted to talk about, but probably need to talk about.
I sat down on my laptop and tried to login to MT.
My internet was down.
I called my cable company where I was greeted with a Very Important Message.
“We’re doing some upgrades in your area. Your internet, phone and cable will be down until 3pm.”
Oh hell no. My blog can wait. One more day without an update here won’t hurt anyone.
However, I have a job that requires me to be online. So, I knew I’d have to drive my ass to Barnes and Noble for the free wifi hookup.
I walked into Barnes and Noble looking for free wifi, but in the back of my mind, I knew that today was the day that Jay Mohr’s new book came out.
I sought it out (it was in the Father’s Day display) just to get a sneak peek (I’ve already pre-ordered from Amazon. Am expecting it any day now.) I read the intro.
I expected to laugh. I did not expected to get choked up.
But I did. I got all teary eyed and kind of wanted to punch Jay in the neck for making me cry while standing in the middle Barnes and Noble.
Most of you know that I absolutely adore Jay. I consider him a friend. Naturally, I want his book to do well.
I also adore my readers. With the exception of the One Woman Who Hates Me and Thinks My Kids Are Fat But Continues to Read My Anyway, You have always been so good to me. I feel incredibly lucky.
So– I went ahead and bought a copy of the book anyway. And I want to give it away to one of you.
All you need to do is leave a comment here. I’ll choose a winner at random tomorrow evening.
If you don’t win, I hope you’ll consider buying a copy for yourself. You can order it here.
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Am a dumbass who forgot to take the sticker off. Taken in the Barnes and Noble bathroom. Because I’m Class-ay.
You can read my interview with Jay here.
(Disclaimer- I purchased the book with my own money and was not asked by Jay to do this giveaway.)
**Comments are now closed. I’ll choose a winner shortly**
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And the winner is… maggie, dammit!

This is What “I’m Taking Back Blogging Because I LOVE TO WRITE” Looks Like. Unfortunately.

My mom is a good cook. She can cook a MEAN Mexican meal. Which is weird because she can’t cook German food. And she’s German!
White people are weird.
As delicious as our meals were growing up, they were not particularly healthy.
In fact, they were not healthy at all.
Almost everything was breaded and fried and smothered in lard. Portion control? WHAT? Are you kidding me? You must have seconds! And thirds! No thirds? ARE YOU STARVING YOURSELF AGAIN?
Vegetables were never served.
Except! Every once in a while, my parents would go on a “You’re going to eat vegetables!” kick and they would force us to eat vegetables.
And by “vegetables” I mean “peas or corn.”
One night, we’d sit down for meatloaf and my Mom would be all “We’re having peas (corn?) tonight. And you have to eat them until their gone!”
I would start crying. My brothers and sister would start crying.
“We hate peas! Peas are gross!” We’d cry.
“Well, you’re gonna learn to like them! They’re good for you!”
Because I am very smart, I figured out that I didn’t have to actually eat the peas. I could put a bunch of peas in my mouth and swallow them down with water. Like pills!
It worked for a while. Until my mom decided that eating peas that way was cheating. I had to actually chew and taste the peas!
(Which to this day, I do not understand.)
One time, my mom pulled the “you have to chew them” crap with corn. CORN! Here’s the thing, corn makes me gag. (I’m a texture girl, remember?) I warned her. “They make me gag! I can’t chew them!” She had no mercy. “CHEW YOUR CORN!”
I chewed my corn.
And then I threw it all up.
Because of this traumatic childhood experience, I rebelled against ALL vegetables in my teenage and young adult years. It was very troublesome to my husband who could live off of vegetables. He’d beg me to try them and I’d be like “vegetables are gross” and he’d be all “but zucchini is delicious! You have to taste it at least once!” and I’d have flash backs to when I was forced! to! chew! peas! AND corn! and I’d be all “NEVER!”
I’m happy to report that I was able to get over the Traumatic Vegetable Experience of my childhood and have learned to eat and enjoy vegetables. I’m even happier to say I’ve been able to teach my children to (mostly) enjoy (some) vegetables.
Except for peas. I have not been able to put one in my mouth since the last time I was forced to eat them. And no child of mine has ever nor will ever be forced to put one of those little satan veggies in their mouth.
Pea H8R 4LIFE.

I Guess What I’m Trying To Say Is That… I’m Sorry, Twitter

Today, for the first time in years, I suffered a massive panic attack.
(I blame Carbonite. More on that later…)
In 2003, I suffered from severe depression and almost debilitating panic attacks. Things got so bad, that I had to take an unpaid leave of absence from work and attend out patient group therapy.
One of the things that I learned in the weeks of therapy was how to deal with panic attacks. So, when I felt this panic attack coming on, I knew what to do.
I tried calling friends. No one answered.
I talked out loud to myself, saying things like “this is JUST a panic attack. You’re going to be fine.”
I took deep breaths.
Then, I did something I kind of regret.
I took it to Twitter.
I’m sure that people probably thought I was being a drama queen, but it was a genuine cry for help. Lucky for me, someone heard and called me. Unlucky for them, I was in the midst of the attack.
If you’ve never suffered a panic attack, you have no idea how awful and frightening they can be. I had hyperventilated to the point that my entire body had gone numb. My legs, my arms, MY FACE. I couldn’t speak, I was shaking, my heart was pounding.
When the phone rang, I didn’t recognize the number, but I answered anyway. As humiliating as it was to answer the phone WHILE HAVING AN ATTACK, I knew that talking to someone could help calm me down. I won’t go into the details of the call, but I will tell you that I was embarrassed and apologized a lot. This wonderful soul was kind and understanding and I can never thank her enough for her kindness.
It took me a couple of hours to recover fully from the emotional and physical effects of the attack.
Of course, I am now slightly alarmed that this could happen again. It’s been so long, I thought perhaps I would never have one again. Now, I’m wondering– do I need to see my psychiatrist again? Would it be wise to ask for medication to prevent this in the future?
I don’t want to overreact. I know this was brought on by a very specific event. (Losing a TON of photos that I *thought* were backed up on carbonite, but, apparently, NOT. Because did you know that if you delete files from your hard drive, Carbonite then deletes those same files 30 days later? Which makes me ask the question– BACKUP SYSTEM, HOW? I suppose it’s my fault for not reading all of the fine print. I suppose I shouldn’t have assumed that a backup system meant all of your files were backed up, even the deleted ones. But, seriously, isn’t that the point of having a backup of your files? So if they are lost or deleted, YOU HAVE A BACKUP OF THE FILE? Stupid, me!) But I can’t help but wonder if this is something I need to speak to a professional about again. Maybe?
We’ll see.
If you follow me on twitter, I do apologize for the trainwreck tweets. I truly wasn’t trying to be a drama queen, I was legitimately reaching out for help. But, even still. AM EMBARRASSED.

“I’m a texture girl.”

If you follow me on Twitter, than you probably know that I hate bananas.
Actually, I have a love /hate relationship with bananas.
I love the flavor of a banana, but I hate the texture.
I love frozen bananas covered in chocolate and nuts.
I love banana bread and banana flavored things. I love dried banana chips.
But plain ol’ bananas?
My mouth hates those.
People are always telling me that I need to buy green-ish bananas, because they are firm! Not mushy at all! Tell that to my mouth, you guys.
The other day I bought a nice greenish bunch of bananas, like the internet told me to do. I opened one up to have a quick snack before leaving for the gym.
The first bite was okay. The second bite? Not so much.
I almost puked.
There were tears running down my face from gagging so hard.
My husband walked into the room just after the gagging episode and was all “Are you okay? What happened?” And I was all “I am trying to eat a banana and I gagged.” And he was all “you’re not supposed to shove the whole thing down your throat.” And I was all “I know that, smart ass. I didn’t. I just took a bite and the texture made me gag.”
And he laughed so hard.
Now, anytime I eat a banana, he watches, shakes his head and says things like “I don’t understand you, woman. Bananas are delicious.”
Then he laughs.
You’re probably thinking to yourself “if she hates bananas, why does she eat them?”
I know, right? I eat them when I need a quick, filling, healthy snack. Usually before or just after working out. They’re so easy. No dicing, cutting or preparing. Just peel that bitch and eat it. Bonus: they’re full of potassium! So, that’s why.
Better a banana than a bag of chips, yes?
The hope I have is that one day I will suddenly, magically love bananas. That the texture will not bother me and I can enjoy one without gagging or making faces of disgust. That hasn’t happened yet.
My hatred of bananas is a constant source of amusement to my husband, who shot this footage of me trying to eat a banana after my workout yesterday.

Basically, that’s what it looks like every time I eat a banana. Sometimes there is more gagging involved than other times.
So, yeah.
Eating bananas is hard, you guys.

On the Down Load.

I think you would laugh if you saw my list of goals for 2010.
It says things like “read more.” “organize my inbox” “start commenting on blogs again.”
(I bet your says things like “finish my book proposal.” “Follow up with Oprah re: the interview.”)
One of the things on that list (and this list is real, you guys) is “update the music on my Generic MP 3 Player.”
This is where I ask for your help.
What is your current favorite workout song? I did this once before and ended up with a great collection of music to kick my own ass to.
(p.s. I am looking for all types of music. Fast, slow, rap, metal. BOY BANDS! All of it, whatever motivates you to move.)

I’m kind of stressing out about what I’m supposed to do with them when I’m running.

I love my new hair stylist. She’s everything I’ve ever wanted in a stylist and more. She’s honest about what she thinks will or will not look good with the shape of your face. She’s an expert with color and gets it perfect every single time. And most importantly, she’s hilarious, fun to talk to and has Big Ones.
Tonight, as I sat in the chair waiting while she mixed my color, she asked if I was upset.
“No, I’m just tired… Oh! Must be the PMS! Didn’t know it was that obvious.”
PMS has always been pretty bad for me, but the last few months it’s become even worse. That is really bad news for everyone in my life. I’m irrational, over emotional, I get angry over stupid things. I cry a lot. I EAT MC RIBS IN MY CAR.
I tell you all of this because tonight I told her I wanted to do something totally different style wise.
“How do you think I’d look with bangs?”
She took a moment to look at my hair, at my face.
“I think they’d look really cute, but you should know I’ll have to cut all the way from here.”
I was all “I’m so nervous, but…do it!”
She asked how much I wanted off the length. I told her to cut it short. She suggested we only cut an inch off the length.
She thought the bangs would be such a drastic change, I may want to take it easy with the length. She said within a week, if I still wanted it short, to come back and she’d do it for free.
After she cut my bangs, I mentioned cutting my hair short again.
“I think it will look CUTE!” I said. (Was totally high from thrill of new bangs. BANGS!)
She leaned over to me and whispered. “I don’t really want to cut it short, I think you’re a liiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiittle hormonal right now and you may regret it later on.”
Love her! She was absolutely right. I do think if she had done it, I would be laying on the floor crying right now saying things like “I LOOK LIKE A WEIRD BOY.” ( Lena totally got that.)
I like the bangs, but they’re taking some getting used to. I feel paranoid about the roundness (fullness? fatness? Oldness?) of my face. I love the idea of them and the way they’re cut, I just have to get used to seeing them on my face.
I think.
Anyway. All this to say…
Bangs!

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