The Balloon Incident

Dragged my kid to a baby shower today. That was almost 2 hours away. In the middle of nap time. It was great to get to see a few old friends, but not exactly the relaxing afternoon it could have been. Whatever. My choice.

So, there were balloons there. What more does a 3.5 year old need, really? He played with a deflated one for a while, then wanted a 'real' one. Filled with helium goodness. I gave him one and tied some cloth ribbon from one of the gifts to the bottom to prevent it from flying away outside. He didn't like that. I tried to tie a few other things to the bottom. He didn't like that either. I tried to tie it to his wrist. Surprise, surprise, he didn't like that. I tried in my best "I can reason with the unreasonable" voice to explain that the balloon would fly away when he went outside if I didn't tie it to something. He didn't like that.

So he walked outside and not 3 feet from the door, let go. Screaming commenced. For a good 10 minutes. Awesomeness.

After calming down (and refusing the SEVERAL other balloons offered to him by myself and various shower attendees), he ventured back outside and requested another balloon. Immediately at least 123048932908 people shouted out "tie it to his wrist this time!".

REALLY??????? What a BRILLIANT idea!!!!!!

The good news is that after the lengthy afternoon, he literally put himself to bed the second we walked through our door. With balloon in tow.

It's mine now, alllllllllll mine! I'm thinking of living on the edge a bit. Perhaps I'll venture outside with said balloon WITHOUT tying it to my wrist. I am craaaaazy.

Oh Hi. Incident.

Yeah, still alive.
Will spare you the details of the goings on in my life. Will entertain you with random tidbits instead.

1. Put a Diet Coke in my fridge at work to chill in the dinky little freezer with the door flap inside the fridge. It actually froze the soda (that thing never freezes ANYTHING! WTF?), so I shook the soda to see if it was indeed frozen. Forgot about said shaking, got into car, pulled out of parking lot, opened soda. Stopped at stop sign, opened door, allowed the half of the soda that hadn't exploded in my car to drip onto the ground. By the time all was said and done, I was wearing more diet coke than what was left in the can, and what was left in the can was frozen. What a pisser.

2. Our house has been invaded by house flies. I guess they are welcome, since they are indeed HOUSE flies, but we're not exactly fans. And have killed at least 15 this evening. Super gross. The bright side is they are a sickly group and very lethargic, so therefore relatively easy to kill. Gonna try to trap some with chopsticks like the Karate Kid.

3. I broke a piece of the ceiling in my classroom today while hanging shit for Open House. This was after a clothesline holding 13 book report mobiles and 13 hot air balloon art projects snapped in half, causing reports and balloons to fly everywhere in the classroom. The 3rd graders were excited, to say the least. It was A DAY. And now I have to figure out how to hide the broken ceiling from my principal. Not quite sure how to do that.

Nice to see ya.

The Tampons Take A Shower Incident

So, in the past 2 months, my dog as eaten my used tampons, my cat has strewn them about the floor to use as toys, and my son has taken one I was about to use and demanded I give it to him because he wanted a period.

Yesterday, my husband told me he had some bad news. Somehow, an almost brand new box of tampons that was on the floor next to the shower ended up IN the shower. Which was on.

How the fuck that happens, I'll never know.

He said he hoped I could still use them.

I'm both cheap and environmentally friendly. They are the kind in the paper wrapper with cardboard tube. You know, products that ABSORB WATER.

So yeah, no, not so much with them being usable still.

SERIOUSLY?????? IS NOTHING SACRED? The inhabitants of my house need to leave my tampons alone. My vagina needs them.

The "I'll Never Get To It Again!" incident

Today, I had to get some glue dots out of my scrapping stuff. Which is buried in my son's closet. And I do mean buried. Like, under a push-toy, basketball toy, stack of grocery sacks, and bag full of cross stitch stuff.

I felt bad enough going through the toys. I didn't even know they were there. When I got to the cross stitch stuff, I totally teared up. It was just another thing I used to do and now will never get to again. Much like cleaning the raisins (or really old grapes?) out of my car, or sleeping. I will never do it again.

Sigh. Then again, I did, at one point, say I'd never drink vodka again (BAAAAAD night in college. Bad. Like, vomiting til 5 pm the next day, bad.), and this past summer, vodka and I reunited. Turns out reunited really does feel so good. So, maybe there's hope that someday I'll finish the cross stitch I started for my friend's kid. Who is now 1. And a half. Right after I figure out how the hell the mini basketball hoop ended up in the closet.

The Incidents Where I Drop Crap

Ummm, just call me bagklutzlady this week.

Yesterday, I spilt tea from my commuter cup on the carpet in my classroom. 2 hours later, I spilt some from a fresh back all over the tile in the back of my classroom. In between those two spills, I knocked over my bell, dropped like 15 pens, and knocked a box off a shelf.

Today I spilt tea from my commuter cup on the back table in my classroom. No less than 2 minutes later, I knocked my hip into the table and spilt more tea.

At this point, 6 students look back at me and, in unison, shout out 'AGAIN'?

Sigh.

I was relieved to get teach Jazzercise tonight knowing for most of the class, I hold nothing, and therefore could drop nothing. Luckily, I managed to stay on both feet the entire class. A minor miracle, no doubt.

The Incident of a REALLY Successful Week

I had such a productive, successful week. This week I managed to.....

1. Confuse and bewilder 25 third graders while teaching long division. For over an hour a day. For 4 days in a row.
Pardon me while I tear my arm off so I can beat myself over the head with it.

2. #1 has helped lead me to my life-long goal of becoming an alcoholic. I accomplished a vital step in that journey this week: drinking a lot.

3. Push my son ever closer to needing serious therapy due to the fact the only time I spent was him was while we were in the car. And I spent that time listening to Jazzercise music and reviewing routines. Yeah, his issues will have issues, pretty sure.

4. Make my ass so incredibly sore, it hurts to walk, stand, sit, or breathe. Because apparently you use your ass when breathing. That's what happens when you teach 7 classes in 4 days. Wowzah.

5. Lose a few pounds. That's what happens when your insides are all f'd up from being over-physically active and over-tired. Things aren't exactly staying put after I eat them. Good times, good times.

6. Add to the earth's soil via the killing of house plants. My longest living house plant, which was at least 9 years old, kicked the bucket this week. In the same week, I've also lost 2 outdoor plants. My neighbor got a fake plant for her front porch. Given the chance, I'd probably kill that, too.

Yup, all together, it was a well-rounded, fulfilling week. I look forward to the next one, where I will likely reach my long-awaited goals of causing multi-car pileups and burning toast repeatedly, all while cutting out any meaningful relationships. Sweet.

The Incident in which I Developed A New Personal Policy

So, I'm on Facebook. Duh. Who isn't? And on this social network, I network socially with a lot of other moms of young kids.

Many moms of young kids don't work outside the house full-time (wonder what that's like?!) and have little side businesses. Power to them. Peddling anything from hair styling to photography to candle selling to whatever. Again, power to them. Rock on, stay at home moms. Making some money off of something you love? Nice. Truly, I think it's great.

Unfortunately, this need to sell shit has combined with social networking and created this monster of LIKE ME contests. You know the ones. "Ohhhh, PLEASE vote for my adorable toofuckincuteforwords child in this contest so we win a free photography session with this random photographer (who, no doubt, is a mom of young kids). All you have to do is 'like' the photographer, then like my picture". Ok, I have NO issue with that. At all. Really.

But my Facebook newsfeed has been BOMBARDED with these contests. And these women post some version of the above announcement like 13 times a day. Be it winning photography sessions, makeovers, haircuts, cards, diapers....whatever.

A few years ago, I instated a personal policy: no 'parties'.
Not like no 'woowhoo let's get wasted' parties. I would never turn down one of those.
I mean no purse parties. Or candle parties. Or jewelry parties. Or kitchen utensil parties. Or tupperware parties. Or flipflop parties. Or stamp parties. Or clothing parties. Or any other party where I have to sit through some eager saleslady's pitch about how this perfect product can be broach, hat, and pterodactyl all in one. The last time I went to a clothing party, the saleslady called a pair of jeans magical. Magical jeans? REALLY? Why, did Harry Potter wear them or something? Please.

The shit being sold is so ridiculously overpriced, I just can't stand it. And teachers? They LOVE these little parties. Being a teacher myself, I hang out with other teachers pretty frequently, and I get invitations to these super special oneofakind events from teacher friends ALL the time. I don't go. It's against my policy. My time and money? I'd rather spend them buying tequila for my next 'woowhoo let's get wasted' party.

So, I've been forced to develop a new policy. It's a no voting for shit on Facebook so my Facebook friends can win some contest policy. You want to win shit? Buy a lotto ticket. Or put a dollar in a change machine. I guarantee you'll win 4 quarters EVERY time.

Best of luck to all the eager contestants and I apologize that you will not have my support. I'm too busy creating my next excuse as to why I cannot attend the beadazzled stapler remover party some teacher invited me to.

The incident where everyone loves my tampons

"Mommy, what's this?" ask my child as he holds a tampon (unused, in wrapper, found on floor where cat left it after playing with it).
"It's a tampon," I answer.
"Goes inside your body?" Yeah, 3 year olds don't really believe in privacy when mom is in the bathroom.
"Yes," I respond, feeling slightly irritated at this point.
"Why?" ok, he asks this about 234903284908 times a day. I don't know why I bother to answer any more. It does not deter him from continuing to ask.
"Because mommies use it when they are on their period. Can I have it back please?"
"Noooooooo!!!!! I want a period!"
For fucks sake. My dog eats my tampons. My cat plays with my tampons. My child takes them and wants them for himself.WILL EVERYONE IN MY HOUSE PLEASE LEAVE MY FUCKING TAMPONS ALONE???????

The Cousin? Incident

Just a quick update on the imaginary characters who have taken up residence in my house.

Mouse, the imaginary pet mouse, is still here. Apparently after he got stepped on and squished several times last week at daycare, my child opted to leave him at home today. As we walked in the door, he said hello to Mouse before he said hello to his father.

Score one for screwed up priorities.

And, we've added an imaginary cousin. Named Julia. She sleeps a lot. So we are often told to speak very quietly so as not to wake her.

Did I mention my child woke me up at 4:45 am this past Sunday? Yeah, we better be quiet so his imaginary cousin, Julia, can get her beauty sleep. Mom's beauty is clearly a lost cause at this point, so we'll just wake her up whenever.

We live in 900 square feet. 3 of us with a 65 pound dog and a cat who is getting fatter by the day. Between all that AND these imaginary characters, I'm really beginning to feel cramped. It makes spending my day between 4 walls with 25 third graders feel downright spacious.

The Incident When I Realized New Years Resolutions Can BITE ME

My Schoolyears Resolution (my resolution I share with my students that is school specific and meant to inspire their resolutions) was to keep my desk cleaner.

How am I doin?

Yeah, New Year's Resolutions can totally bite me. Sigh. There's always next year. Right?

The Incident In Which Dough Was Saved, and Cookies Were Tossed

If you are squeamish, you might want to skip this one. It's gross. You've been warned. Just be thankful I didn't include pictures.

Ok, so let me begin a few weeks ago. I was going for a jog very late in the afternoon on New Years Eve. The dog and I stopped at a light and as we waited to cross the street, I couldn't help but notice the young woman in the car in front of me. I could not tell you what she looked like, or what kind of car it was. What caught my attention was the fact that she was clearly singing loudly along to whatever tune was crankin' on her stereo and she was all dressed up. In my mind, it was me 10 years ago. Before marriage, before a kid. Heading out on the town for a fun filled evening, ready to impress my friends, and strangers, with my new outfit or earrings or perfume or whatever, drawing positive energy from some rockin' tunes, ready to abuse substances and make poor choices. Yeah, I totally used to be her.

Of course, I couldn't help but think "WHAT HAPPENED LIFE? THIS IS WHAT I'VE BEEN REDUCED TO? JOGGING ON NEW YEARS EVE WITH NO PLANS TO GO ANYWHERE?"

Yeah, so tonight, Fate decided to intervene and remind me that jogging with the dog on New Years Eve was a fucking tropical vacation compared to what my life has actually been reduced to.

Fast forward to this past Saturday evening. After spending 30 minutes battling over dinner with my child (and believe me, I don't battle. I simply restate my position, calmly, repeatedly, while he screams back at me. He battles. Super fun. Super. Fun.), we accomplished bath and bedtime with only minor breakdowns. After putting him down, I headed into the kitchen to continue the cooking I had been doing most of the day, when I heard a strange sound from upstairs.

Upon walking up the stairs, I see the dog in the bathroom with garbage scattered EVERYWHERE. Not just any garbage. Period garbage. I was on the final days of my period and, because I attempt to avoid large plumbers' bills, the garbage was full of used tampons and pads.

Ok, so I examine the garbage that's all over the floor a little more closely and realize it's not just scattered. It's gone. It's reduced to little scraps of toilet paper and plastic applicators. The used tampons? Gone. The pads? Also gone. My dignity? Oh, who am I kidding, that went out the door with childbirth.

Can you hear Fate? Can you hear her maniacal laughter? Bitch.

Yeah, the dog clearly ate my tampons. My USED tampons. TamponSSSSSSSSSSS.

The thoughts began whirling through my head. The first thought. YOU FUCKING STUPID-ASS DISGUSTING DOG!!!!!!!!!!!!!

That thought was followed with a few others, involving far less swearing.

Do I take him to the emergency vet? Hmmmm, costly and tricky, since my husband was gone and the kiddo was sleeping. And I had food in the oven. And had ingested some wine. I know, so unlike me. Anyways.

Do I hope that death is quick and painless? I mean, really, if the dog died, would it be the worst thing? One less responsibility, one less expense. Ok, I KNOW this makes me a cold heartless bitch, and I SWEAR I only thought those thoughts briefly. Swear.

Do I just wait it out, conveniently forget to mention it to my husband, and pray that his poop is filled with used tampons at some point in the next 72 hours?

Having had no easy solution present itself, I turned to my trusty answer source: Google. My trusty answer source confirmed my suspicions. Dogs do eat tampons, it is disgusting, and it is vet-trip worthy. Damn it. Every source mentioned inducing vomiting.

Wait a tampon-pickin' second. Inducing vomiting? That can't be THAT hard. Certainly not worth paying some vet $400 to do. Right? Right.

Google again. It informed me that hydrogen peroxide induces dog vomiting. And as we all know, if it's on the Internet, it must be true. Sweet. Even better, I knew we totally had a bottle of it. I find the bottle and look at the date. Hmmmm, does it still work if it expired in July 2007? The answer to that is no. I gave him the dose that Google told me to give and waited. And waited. And waited. No go. Realistically, I probably could have just given him a syringe full of water or Sprite or something and had the same effect.

One text to our fabulous neighbor presented an unexpired bottle of hydrogen peroxide at my door just a few moments later. And she was kind enough to put on pants before coming over. Love her.

Dose #2 down. Vomiting quickly commenced. So. Gross. SOOOOOOOOO gross. Right there, in my living room, a gigantic pile of used, chewed up tampons presented itself. Gag. Me. Tough to tell how many, but I'm guessing around 6. SIX. SIX FUCKING USED TAMPONS. SERIOUSLY??????? Oh. My. God. BLECH!!!!!!!!

Be thankful I didn't take a picture. Not gonna lie, it did briefly occur to me. Before I slapped myself across the fucking face and screamed "WHY IN THE HELL WOULD YOU DO THAT?".

I cleaned up the vomit/tampon pile, scoured our bathroom, threw all rugs and towels in the washer, then proceeded to be so distracted and disturbed by the entire situation that I slightly burned a batch of pumpkin granola and, later on, a batch of homemade tator tots. Can you blame me?

The good news is that I saved us $400 at the emergency vet, our bathroom floor is now fabulously cleaned, and our house will soon possess a bottle of hydrogen peroxide that is not expired. The bad news is that jogging on New Years Eve is several steps up from what Fate and Life have determined my Saturday nights are to be for a while: gross, vomit-filled, cleaning opportunities. At least I don't need to waste my time finding the perfect outfit, right?

The Incident Where Everything I Touched Turned to a Mess

Yesterday. Friday. Not my best day ever.

Morning started with a series of tantrums (3 year old, not me, I swear). And a random red, itchy eye (me this time, not the 3 year old. I looked stoned. Like I smoked pot and only inhaled using my right lung, thus causing only my right eye to get bloodshot).

Made it to the car. Realized that due to tantrums, I forgot to change something REALLY important before leaving the house, and now was leaking everywhere. Desperate times called for desperate measures. I pulled a handful of kleenex out of the box and stuffed it in my underwear, praying that would hold me over til getting to work. Ghetto, I know. But what else could I have done? Mess #1, contained.

We pulled out of the garage only afew minutes later than normal. Not too shabby. On mornings like that, I seriously think there should be a marching band standing there playing "Eye of the Tiger" and a crowd of people cheering you on when you pull away from your house. Is it weird that I actually get disappointed when there isn't?

Anyways.

Two blocks in my commute, my commuter cup full of chai latte tips over and spills everywhere, cuz I forgot to shut it. Mess #2. And mess #3, cuz the second I put it down, it tipped again and spilled again.

At work, I seriously dropped every pen, pencil, book, and piece of paper I picked up. By the end of the day, some of my students were tempted just to sit on the floor to decrease the amount of times they had to get up and down to pick up the shit I kept dropping. Mess #4 was just continual throughout the day.

Oh, and I swear I don't make them pick up my shit. They all are eager to do it. Brown nosers. Kidding. They just want an excuse to get up out of their seats. Half the time they drop their pencils on purpose just for an excuse to crawl around on the floor for a bit.

School day ends, I'm back in the car heading out to run errands. Kiddo drops a full cup of grapes all over the back seat. Mess #5. I drop a grape under my foot and squish it on the floor mat. Mess #6. At store, he wants a banana. I have no wipes or napkins or anything to deal with banana mess (clearly, I was SO prepared). Mess #7. Driving home, I reach for my blue tooth so I can legally call my husband and somehow manage to fling it halfway across the car. We'll call that mess #8, except it wasn't really messy. Frustrating though, cuz I still can't find the damn thing.

Get home. Feeling like I might be in the clear for the rest of the day as I pull into the garage. Pick up commuter cup from the morning, which I apparently forgot to shut. Spill some very old, very cold leftover latte all over me. Mess #9. Get out of the car carrying so many bags full of shit from the day, I look like a Sherpa. Out falls my brand new, most favorite plastic water cup that I use at work. It breaks. Mess #10.

Pause while visualizing me stomping my feet and swearing loudly in my garage. My turn for the temper tantrum. Not my finest moment.

I created mess #11 in my kitchen. Vicious combination of wine and dessert. Totally worth it, and totally deserved, in my opinion anyways.

But what do I know? I'm clearly just a mess!

The Incident in Which My Child Totally Got Me

Saturday evening. Hubs was gone working all day. Kiddo was a nightmare. Night. Mare. We were going on 30+ minutes of temper tantrums when I happened to glance at the clock. And noticed it was after 5. Hallelujah!!!!!!!!!

So, while the kiddo continued to literally kick and scream on the floor next to me in our kitchen (which is the size of a closet, I kid you not), I calmly stepped over him, pulled a bottle of wine out of the fridge, shuffled around him to the drawer, and pulled out the corkscrew.

Around this time he paused his epic meltdown to check out what I was doing.

"Is that mommy's wine?"

"Damn straight, kiddo. This is you driving me to drink."
Ok, not really. I really said "Yes, that's mommy's wine."

"YAY! Good idea Mommy! Good job". Clap clap clap.

I'm not kidding. Not only did his antics drive me to drink, but he fully supported my choice.

Not sure if that's a good thing, or a bad.

The Incident Where I Deserved a Starbucks

It's been flippin' COLD here. Ok, I live in the San Francisco Bay Area and it doesn't get THAT cold here, compared to the rest of the country. But days when it doesn't make it out of the low 40s is just freakin' freezing, Mr. Bigglesworth.

Yes, I know, I'm a big fat wimp. I could never live where it snows and is ACTUALLY cold.

Anyways.

So, I get to work this morning and am rushing through the parking lot to get inside where it's warm. Dropping armloads of crap along the way. The amount of shit I schlep to work...it's ridiculous.

Anyways. Again.

I'm about to dash across the loop (the fancy word for 'fake street where cars drive, then stop to dump out their kids') when I hear "Oh, Mrs. Teacher, just real quick".

Ok, unless you are stopping a teacher to give them a freshly brewed cuppa somethin' somethin' from Starbucks, it is not ok for parents to stop their child's teacher in the parking lot before they have even walked through the door to the school.

Yet, that is exactly what happened. This father had been waiting in his car for me so he could discuss the homework from the night before.

SERIOUSLY? Soooooo not ok.

And, he did not have Starbucks. Shocking, right? Or anything else, for that matter. Besides an earful about fraction homework. In a freezing cold parking lot.

Can I get a hell no? Cuz hellllll no, that is not an ok way to start a Friday!

Next time he wants to chat, he either needs to make a freakin' appointment or bring me a freakin' Starbucks.

The Yard Duty Ditching Incident

I haven't been sleeping enough. I sleep like a rock pretty much the second I get into bed, but my bedtime keeps getting later and later. I'm tired.

Today, I could barely keep my eyes open. Yawning in front of my students was not exactly sending the best message. It's my job to make things like fractions and plural nouns super exciting. Not that those things aren't super exciting on there own....

So, I did what any good teacher would do. I drank caffeinated tea. Lots of it.

Teachers do not get enough bathroom breaks to have multiple cups of tea. I decided it was worth it. And if anything, the urgent need to pee would help keep me awake.

So, by the end of the day, I was dying. I did use the restroom during lunch, but apparently that wasn't enough. So, of course, I had stupid yard duty today. Pick-up duty. A fun-filled time of telling kids to quit pushing each other, opening car doors, picking up the garbage that falls out of cars and tossing it back in, and asking parents to use the crosswalk rather than risk the life of their child by darting through the parking lot with them. Really, it's a fantastic way to end the day. I live for pick-up duty.

Alas, I ditched it briefly to pee. Worth it. Just don't tell any of the yard-duty Nazis as school, k? There are some hard core yard-dutyers out there, and I don't want to get in trouble.

The Mouse Got My Breakfast Incidient

This morning was my LAST morning of winter break. So naturally, my child was thoughtful enough to wake me up at 6 AM so I could thoroughly enjoy my last day of break to its fullest. How freakin' thoughtful of him.

I was NOT awake at that hour. At. All.

So, we stumbled down the stairs and I remembered I had pancakes left over from the previous morning. Score. No cooking at 6 AM. Sweet.

I bust out the pancakes and heat all 3 up, with the intention of giving him the two small ones, and me the bigger one.

The 3 year old had other plans. Apparently, his imaginary pet mouse, who is appropriately named Mouse, was hungry. So hungry, in fact, that he needed my pancake.

Not wanting to deal with a tantrum before caffeine, I set my pancake on a plate for Mouse, along with a single dried cranberry (kiddo's insistence. Because Clearly, after eating a whole pancake, a mouse would only have room for one dried cranberry) and set it at the empty seat at the table.

I asked the kid several times if I could have it. Each time he pointed to Mouse (well, I'm assuming it was Mouse anyways. Hard to tell, seeing as how he's invisible) and told me no.

I left the house before 9 to go teach a class. Upon arriving home at 10:30, the pancake at the empty seat still remained.

WTF Mouse? You too good for my pancakes?

Maybe my New Year's resolution should be to drop some pounds. Because if I have to give a fucking imaginary mouse all my food, the pounds will melt away.