That Moment When....

(I wrote this exactly 5 years ago. It's still hilarious. We refer to it often. Not sure if we ever made it public though.  Enjoy.)

In an effort to prepare for the great "Back to School" festivities I decided to take the kids for haircuts.  If you'd seen The Oldest in the recent past you'd know that his hair was in an unfortunate state of entanglement.  It resembled an octopus type creature and growled at me any time I mentioned "conditioner", a "brush", or "hair cut".  After it made a meal request and invited guests over for a large dinner party I decided that it needed to go.  The Oldest could no longer keep it in check or calm it down so he agreed that the bonds must be severed.  The Middle and The Youngest Boy had been referred to as "she", "her" or "daughters" enough that they were also begging for cuts.  There's one particular girl that's cut the kids' hair for years and she happens to work at the salon ( a term I use loosely in this instance) inside Wal Mart and the kids like her a lot.  So I load up the Brangelina Brood into the Super Mom Van and head out.  As I'm backing out of the driveway I hear a familiar clicking noise that tells me that I'm in desperate need of an oil change if I really want to make it to West Mansfield this weekend. 

Hey- I like multitasking.  Makes me feel all productive and stuff.  So what could be easier???  Drop the van off at the Lube station in Wal Mart while I take the kids to get their mops chopped!  Brilliant!  I'm so smart.  :-)  This will be a cinch.  In we go, drop off the keys and head to the salon.  The Oldest is the first to suffer the indignity of the chair.  He starts by removing the Legend of Zelda beanie that has been firmly in place every day for the past 2 years.  The stylist gasped.  I tried to hide so that the people checking out did not see me standing near him.  Normally, I do my best to embarass my kids.  I don't get embarassed personally.  This was the exception.  But in order to complete the white trash sterotype I broke out the Flip and proceeded to take video footage for YouTube.  Maybe I'll send the clip to Daniel Tosh.  ;-)  The stylist went to work.  It took her 2 hours to brush out his hair.  Seriously.  2 hours.  (Yup, I'm mother of the year!)  She then put it in a pony tail and snipped it off.  He briefly used it as a prop - he was a horse - and then it bit him.  We wrestled it into a zip lock baggie.  It put up one helluva a fight though.  I had to bribe it with promises of cupcakes to get it into my purse.  Another stylist came in and took care of The Middle and The Youngest Boy in the meantime.  They all turned out pretty cute for a Wal Mart cut. 

About the time that they were all finished up the vibrating keychain that the Lube Center provided me was going off indicating that the van was complete.  At this point I am quite proud of myself!  Mini-Me had been good the whole time, the boys were getting antsy but nothing I couldn't handle.  So I pull out my wallet to pay the lady and my heart stopped.  The whole world went topsy turvy for a moment.  My debit card - my ONLY access to money - was NOT in my wallet.  Frantically, I pulled every card from it and sorted through them....  Kroger Plus card, CVS Rewards Card, Sally's Club, Edge Card, K Mart Special, Big Lots Rewards, my useless ATM card, my drivers license.  None of them could pay for the haircuts.  Then it dawns on me.  My debit card is on the couch.  At home.  My van is in the shop.  Even if I could leave The Oldest at the salon I couldn't run home because I can't pay for my van! Oh.  Holy.  Hell.

Just then Mini-Me breaks out into a frenzied cry for a boob, The Youngest Boy starts jumping off of seats, The Middle is hungry, The Oldest is bored, the stylist wants her money and her hefty tip for braving the violent tendrils of my 14 year old, everyone and everything is louder and I can feel my face running the gamut of every shade of red known to man.  I'm sure it settled on a deep crimson.   My brain starts to go into high gear as my adrenaline starts to rush.  My sister is at work, in Kettering.  It's 4:00.  No one is home.  What the hell am I going to do???  Okay - I'll text everyone in my phone book that could possibly assist.  Jessy was already workin.  Then I call Amber who can be there in an hour and a half.  I've got to be at The Middle Son's school for 2nd grade orientation and I promised a trip to JD's Custard.  Finally, Kyle comes through.  He will come and get The Oldest, run him to the house and then bring him back.  In the meantime we must wait in the salon.  I whip out a nipple for Mini-Me and ask the boys to sit down and be patient.  Help is on the way!

As I am nursing Mini-Me, The Middle has to pee.  I agree to letting him run to the restroom.  Well, The Youngest Boy  takes off after him.  So I jump up - Mini-Me still attached to my right breast - and try to chase him down and get him back where he belongs.  Yeah - that wasn't humiliating in the slightest.  Around 4:40 Kyle arrives and grabs The Oldest.  There was a light at the end of the tunnel!  By this time the boys have maxed out the attention span.  They're restless.  They've invented a game out of a nickel and the floor which ends in a fight and crying.  I want to shrivel up and die.  Or evaporate.  Anything other than this!  Every second that Kyle and The Oldest were gone went so slowly.  I could hear every tick of the clock.  Finally, they return with the card in hand!  I apologize profusely for the stylists inconvenience and generously tipped her.  Then we headed to the Lube Center and retrieved my keys.  I drove away from Wal Mart like Barney Oldfield (he was an old race car driver that my dad always compared us to). 

We made it to JD's.  Not to orientation though.  I know, priorities!  Went home as fast as we could and decided that we won't be going to Wal Mart any time soon.   Be on the lookout for my pic on Peopleofwalmart.com in the next week or so.   

Get The Ladder D-Von!

I've done some incredibly stupid things in my life.  Once, when I was 5 or so I decided that I was going to make my 'rents laugh so hard that they'd have no choice but to commission a parade in my honor.  Ever watched Dumb & Dumber?  There's this scene where Lloyd (Jim Carrey) imagines that he shows up to Mary Swanson's house with her missing briefcase and in celebration & thanks her family invites him in for tea and strumpets.  They are all sitting by the fireplace in oversized sweaters, cozy & warm, watching Lloyd do incredibly funny things with a lighter and a fart.  They all love him.  Yeah - that's kinda how I thought this would be.  My aunt Joyce was in from Tennessee.  My mum didn't get to see her often.  So they were all sitting around the fire in the living room, looking at old photographs and talking about the good ole days.  I was in the dining room rummaging through my mum's sewing box that was left on the table.  Looking through her things was one of my favorite pastimes.  In my adventure (In my head it was an archaeological dig) I came across this lone button.  It was safely housed in a tiny, ziploc baggie.  I opened the bag and took the small, red button out and the cogs started turning in my head.  How can I use this little treasure to insight riotous laughter into the family in the next room?  Ah - With my NOSE!  The thought was that I can take this button, place it in the opening of my nostril, cover the other nostril and blow that button out so hard that it goes flying across the room.  They will love me.  The flaw in this glorious plan was that I breathed in really hard so that I could exhale really hard.  Can you guess where the button went? 

There was no laughter.  Only fear, panic, some words inappropriate for a young child's ears and a disbursement of the crowd.  I was scooped up into my mum's arms and placed in the car.  My dad put on his jacket and got his keys.  Off we went to the Emergency Room.  Some time later I was prepped for surgery.  The red button had made it's way into my sinus cavity and could not be reached with tweezers.  We departed the hospital just in time for my Aunt to fly back to Tennessee.  She died about 6 months later.  I decided that I wouldn't try that again any time soon.  I went on to commit some other interesting acts of stupidity - Tweezers into the electrical outlet no less than two times, feeding my friend real mud pies, washing my 'rents antique, wooden bedroom suite with Ajax, dropping my newborn sister on her ginormous head....  The list could go on!

A few years ago, Ex Douchebag & I decided to resurrect a notoriously violent wrestling promotion.  He has an affinity for certain brands of hardcore wrestling - namely tables, ladders & chairs (TLC Matches).  I've often feared for his life in the hundreds upon hundreds of matches I witnessed.  Only once have I ever walked out of a show  He was climbing a ladder when it started to sway and subsequently fell over.  He got tangled in the ropes and I couldn't tell you what happened after that.  I left.  He went on to participate in quite a few more of these nauseating matches that terrified me to the core.    The day of the show he purchased an ugly, aluminum, yellow, 6ft ladder.  I watched helplessly as he climbed to the top and our friend, knocked him off.  Repeatedly.  This ladder bent and folded and opened and closed.... Generally, you don't want to re-use those ladders after they take that type of abuse.  When Ex Douchebag & I split up and I moved out of our home I left many of his things behind, mostly his old weapons - a table, a folding chair, trashcans.  He was supposed to go pick those things up.   But for some reason I couldn't leave that hideous ladder behind.  Not sure why, it's not like I can use the derned thing.  I have zero intentions of ever using a ladder for anything at any time.  If I can't stand on a chair then I don't need it.

Well - I ate my words today.  This morning was going so well.  I got up on time, got the kids dressed and ready, got The Middle Son to an appointment on time (a first!) and was generally in an incredible mood.  Pulled into the driveway, unloaded The Middle Son & The Youngest Boy and proceeded to rouse a slumbering Mini-Me.  The boys sat on the chairs on the front porch to wait.  I decided to just give them my keys so they could get out of the heat.  As a Public Service Announcement - I can't throw.  Unless I'm REALLY angry.  Throwing like a girl is an understatement.  With my left hand I went to toss The Middle Son my house/car keys.  And as if on purpose - my keys sailed through the blue sky right smack dab onto my roof and trailed down into the gutter.

You've got to be kidding me.  Really?  Landing in the bushes I can understand and even expect.  Hell - landing 823 feet from the intended target would normally be the result.  Not today.  Today they land on the roof.  I can't decide to laugh or cry.  So I laughed.  And then reality started to creep it's way up my spine.  Oh no.  How am I going to get them down?  There's no chair tall enough to reach my roof.  I am a towering 5'1".  This cannot be really happening, right?  Alan Funt is about to pop out any second and point out the multiple hidden cameras and explain how they used a superpowered magnet to set me up.... How'd they know I always keep a spare house key on my person at all times?

My only option is to dig that unreliable ladder out of the garage and retrieve my keys from what I am sure is a slimy, filthy gutter.  I'm envisioning worms, maggots and the full menu from Fear Factor in there.  After I instructed The Oldest to mail my updated life insurance policy which happened to be sitting on the computer desk in the event that I fell - I headed to the garage.  Bravely I got the ladder to the front of the house.  I can see where it's been bent and damaged from the last time it was used.  Joe Rogan is somewhere behind me telling me not to throw up.  Quickly I climb one rung at a time until I reach the point of no return.  I feel around and cannot locate my keys.  I have to take another step.  If I fall it's really going to hurt.  I spy my Wonder Woman keychain, grab her feet and pull her towards me.  Shockingly, it's clean in there!  But I'm not going to risk standing there examining any more of it!  Got down and away without injury or incident.

I won't be throwing my keys again though.  Ever.

"You Didn't Say 'God Bless You'"

Sushi is my favorite food.  Around my 30th birthday Ex Douchebag took me to a fabulous little sushi place and I immediately fell in love.  Up to that point it was macaroni & cheese (which still holds a very dear spot in my heart).  Not just any mac n cheese.  Had to be Kraft.  With the powdered cheese packet and a little too much milk.  Mmmmmm........ heaven.  Don't get me wrong - Alton Brown makes an immaculate mac & cheese.  I use that for things like carry ins, potlucks or when I'm in the mood to gain 57 pounds.

When you become a parent you soon realize that eating is going to be a spectator sport.  I prepare it.  I plate it.  I watch it fly in large quantities all over the table, floor, children's faces.....  Then I clean it.  Sometimes, if I am really lucky - I get to partake.  I just don't have time.  As I sit here with no kids and my pintos n cheese are getting cold on the table next to me.

Yesterday was one of those "If you can eat it and drive at the same time you'd better do it" days. There were so many things to do that I didn't have time.  The final task of the day was to pick the boys up from Vacation Bible School.  The kids are so excited to be participating in it and are very enthusiastic about telling me about what they have learned.  So last night at 11ish I decided to toss a can of tuna in a bowl (I generally do not eat animals - I make exceptions for evolutionary mishaps such as poultry.  Those things have wings they should fly if they don't want to be eaten).  To spice it up I toss in a dash of mayo, some sour cream, some oregano & basil and a scoshe of relish for color.  I plop down on the couch with my bowl, some wheat thins (the Kroger brand because I'm poor) and my little girl.  I share a few bites with Mini-me and she is satisfied with snagging a cracker.

Middle Son and Youngest Boy take this quiet time to tell me what they have learned in this evenings lesson.  They made little cross necklaces with colored beads.  Each bead color has a meaning and Middle Son is explaining each one to me.  Finally he gets to the last ones - hearts.  He proceeds to clarify that these were just ones he added just because he liked them.  At this point he is now very, very close to me.  I have my bowl resting in my hands in front of me so that I can actively listen to what he is telling me.  As the words "I Heart Jesus" are passing through his lips a sneeze is passing from his nose.  Into. My. Bowl.  I scream while watching as his spittle particles are traveling at a high rate of speed right smack dab into my dinner.  Part of me is laughing.  Part of me is ticked.  But all I can do is look at my food in horror.  And disgust.  And slight contemplation as to whether or not I am going to take another bite.  So I yell "YOU JUST 'I HEART JESUS'd" INTO MY DINNER!"

He says, with the most innocent eyes, "You didn't say 'God Bless You" so now you owe me $10."