I'm a SuperStah!

O. M. G.

Mo from Momfeld has bestowed this prestigious honor on me.  I haven't been following Mo long, but when I ran across a post or another of hers a while back, I knew right away she was my people.  Snarky sense of humor: check.  Ability to make me think: check.  Ability to make me laugh out loud: check.  Yep, my people.

Anyway, she gave me this award, and while I'm thrilled to accept it, I did want to know where it came from.

 So I started to trace it back.  (I'm an ISTJ, remember? I can't help myself.) 

So anyway, here's what I found:

Mo got the award from Life Breath Present who got it from Alphabet Salad who got it from joyofnine9 who got it from Good Time Stories who got it from The Always Believer who got it from Belsbror who got it from Kintal who got it from Radical who got it from Twinkling Star who got it from... I don't know.  The trail grows cold there, but that's ok.  So did my attention span.

So anyway, without further delay, here are the questions that I need to answer in order to accept my Emmy... er, whatever.

What is the funniest thing about you?  Well, I'm a bit of a smart aleck, and I consider myself very observant.  As a result, I have a running commentary about the world going on in my head ALL THE TIME about what's happening around me.  This means that I often laugh out loud at totally inappropriate times.  Honestly, I think I'm the funniest person I know, but most of it stays in my head, where it rightfully belongs.  

Who is your favorite personality?  Hmmm.  I don't really do "personalities." But I like people who make me laugh.  And I love snarky people.  Ok, I've go it!  Robert Downy, Jr.  In addition to being IronMan (big win!) he is so full of himself sometimes that you can't help but laugh at him. 

What is your lucky thing?  I don't really have a lucky thing, although I consider myself to be a person who has a lot of luck.  A great deal of it is bad, though.  That still counts, right?

What is your favorite weather?  SPRING!!!!  Is it spring yet?  Seventy degrees, sunny and with a slight breeze ruffling the leaves is really the only weather I adore.  Here in Kentucky we get that for approximately three hours every year before the humidity sets in to stay.  By the way, this has been the longest winter of my life.  Is it spring yet?

A name that you want to give me.  A name for Mo?  Let's see.  "Authentic."  I think Mo is one of those people that you could sit down to have a cup of coffee with and she would be EXACTLY the same in real life as she is on her blog. That's incredibly brave and it's something I strive to do more of every single time I write.

There you have it!  My acceptance of this fabulous award is now complete.

And for my nomination, I nominate...

YOU!

Yes, YOU!  Stop looking around behind you.  I'm talking to YOU!  

Go forth, write yourself a post and answer these questions as you see fit.

I think that anyone who shares pieces and parts of herself on the internet day after day, week after week, month after month, year after year deserves to be commended and called out for it.

YOU are a superstar! 

My best of 2013.

I've been blogging for almost seven years, and I've never done a wrap-up or "best of" year end post before.  I'm not sure why not.  Maybe it's because this time of the year is always so busy and I didn't want to take time to re-read everything I've ever written.  Maybe it's because my personality usually dictates that I'm always moving on to the next thing instead of looking back.  Whatever the reason, it's never really occurred to me before.  

But I've been feeling sort of BLAH about blogging lately.  I feel like my writing is mediocre.  I have IDEAS, they're just not coming to fruition like I want them to.  So when I decided to look back over the past year and highlight a few favorite posts, I was pleasantly surprised to find some good work - really good writing - that I could highlight. 

These are not my most popular posts.  They are not the ones that received the most comments or shares.  But to me, they are the best written, the funniest, the most heartfelt.  I hope you will take a minute or two to click through to something you might have missed.  

Seven.  Zachary turned seven. I think my best writing comes when I'm talking about things I love unconditionally, like this kid right here.

Practical advice for beginning runners - I've been running for three and a half years, and this is all the stuff I really wish I would have known before I started.

Advice for raising boys - If only I would have taken this advice seriously when I first heard it, I would be in such a better place now.

Polite boys - A total stranger really made my day.  I highly recommend you do it for someone else, too.

All that glitters - I've felt like my writing has been really flat this year, but then I ran across this post and I remembered that I really can be funny sometimes, too.  Oh, and no baby vampires were harmed in the writing of this post.

Thoughts on raising readers - I'm raising my boys to be readers.  It's important to me.  Here's how I'm doing it.

Defining me - Like most women I know, I insist on labeling myself.  Here are just a few of the things that I am.

Mayberry - the movie I cast all the roles from the Andy Griffith show with current actors.  If I could only find an Opie...

A ribbon for showing up - My thoughts on rewarding mediocre behavior.  Spoiler: I'm against it. 

Happy Mother's Day - to me!  Becoming a mama changed me profoundly... for the better.

On becoming a stay at home Mama - year three.  I celebrated my third anniversary of staying home with my kids with this post about how different I am now.  It's a good, good thing.

Apple, meet tree.  Zachary and I are the same person, except for all the ways we are not.

On bad coffee, fresh perspectives and an attitude adjustment.  Cooper never fails to amaze me with his outlook on life.  He teaches me something every day.

Introverted parents, extroverted kids - My kid is an extrovert.  I am decidedly not.  This is how I cope.

He's becoming more - I feel sometimes like Zachary is starting to outgrow me just a little.

In the eye - On this particular day, Cooper made me feel like the most beautiful girl in the world.

Oh nuts.  - I don't think those words meant what he thought they meant.

Five secrets for successful marriage - I should have it down by now.  After all, I've married the same man twice.

Note to a younger me - I sum up what I would tell my younger self in only two words.  Well, sort of.

Sounds of silence - Morning time is MY time.  Until it isn't any more.

Eight books - the eight books that changed me.


So.  There you go.  These are the posts that stand out in my mind and my heart as my best writing of the year.  Some are meaningful, some are funny, some are informational, but they all add up to a pretty good look back on 2013 for me.

What's the best thing you wrote (or if you're not a writer, what's the best thing you read) in 2013?

The Liebster

Imagine my surprise when I found out that Andrea from About 100%  had nominated me - little ole me! - for the prestigious blogging award known as The Liebster.

"I'd like to thank the academy, and all the little people I stepped on on my way to the top, and my third grade teacher for never giving up on me, and my family and friends and even that one mean girl from high school who I still hate TO THIS DAY but without her in all her meany-pants meanness I wouldn't be the disturbed, troubled soul I am today and I wouldn't be able to turn out such refreshing, relevant content on an semi-annual basis like I do now." 

Ahem.

Anyway, like all fame this award comes with a price, and that price is that you have to follow these very simple rules:

11 random facts about me:

1. I was a cheerleader for six years and I also played basketball for four years when I was in elementary school.  I was really terrible at both.  One year I tried to quit basketball but I couldn't because then my tiny elementary school would not have had enough girls for a team.

2. Although I don't consider myself to be overly emotional at ALL there are two songs that make me cry every single time I hear them - Blue Eyes Crying in the Rain by Willie Nelson, and He Stopped Loving Her Today by George Jones.  Yep, I'm a flaming redneck.  Deal with it.

 3. I dislike writing with pens.  Pencils are always preferred.  Mechanical ones are the best.  .9 lead (that's the really fat kind) is divine. 

4. I secretly (and not so secretly) dream of somehow obtaining enough money that I could buy enough land to live far, far away from the rest of the world.  My family could come though.  I like them all pretty well.

5. I currently have seven different to do lists/calendar systems, but they still fail me somehow.  Some are paper, some are electronic, and all of them fall short of my expectations.  

6. There are eight days until Christmas and I have not wrapped a single thing, which is so unlike me I cannot even describe it.  For many years I would have everything purchased and wrapped before Thanksgiving.  The fact that I'm not freaking out about this is baffling.

7.  All of my shoes come from the little girls' department.  I wear a size 3. It makes it exceptionally difficult to find really cute dress up shoes, but I can rock my light up Skechers like nobody's business.  Another bonus? Kids' shoes are usually half the price (or less) of their adult counterparts.

8. I hate talking on the phone.  Hate.  HATE.  If the phone rings and it's not a number I recognize, I will not answer it.  EVER.  I have even considered switching dentists and pediatricians for the the boys even though I like mine just fine because I would really love to have one who makes appointments online.  The day we took the landline out of our house was seriously one of my favorite days ever.

9. My dream job would be some sort of combination of reading books, writing about books, editing books, and researching random things.  They all kind of go together, right? I'm an excellent reader, a passable writer, an ok editor (except of my own work, for some reason) and an inspired researcher of random things.  Do NOT underestimate my ability to find shit out.

10. I walk faster than anyone else. I get twitchy and impatient when I get behind someone who is walking slowly. My husband fusses at me when we are out together because even though he's a foot taller than me, he has a hard time keeping up with me.

11. I drive like a little old lady. I usually go about 2 miles under the speed limit, and I like to get in the lane I will need to turn from and stay there as early as possible. I also loathe making left turns. It just feels unnatural.  Also, I will go through great lengths to avoid crossing two lanes of traffic at once.  And by "go to great lengths" I mean I won't do it. So there.  You can't make me.


11 questions from Andrea:  

1. What embarrasses you?

Um, pretty much everything.  I'm kind of an old prude at heart.  Also, I'm terribly socially awkward so I often walk away from an encounter wondering "What the HELL did I just say?"  and then I get embarrassed all over again.  I'm blessed with the "flushed face" gene, which means that every single time I get embarrassed, which is quite often, my face turns to roughly the color of a tomato.

2. How much do you swear around your kids, if you have kids?  If you don’t have kids, how much do you swear in general?

Too damn much.  I really try to watch what I say around them but sometimes life gets the best of me and I say things I know I shouldn't say.  I also think I probably curse too much on this blog, but there are times when a rousing "gol' dang it" just does not convey how strongly I feel about something.

3. Do you speak a foreign language?  Why or why not?

Between high school and college, I had a total of 6 years of French.  I was never a great speaker (stupid country accent) but I was conversant. I can't really follow spoken conversations any more, but I'm surprised by how well I can still read it. 

4. If you could live anywhere else in the world, where would it be?  It’s okay if you say “right where I am now.”  I won’t judge you for being boring.

My hubby and I play the "if we were rich" game sometimes, and my dream place would be on a really big piece of land, far away from the rest of civilization.  I'm not terribly picky about the where so much as the how, but I really kinda like 'Merica, so long as it was somewhere with a mild climate.

5. Outside of your family and yourself, what is your biggest love?

Books.  Reading.  Words.  

6. What is one thing you are terrible at?

I can only choose one?  There are so many...  Ok.  I already told you about being a terrible driver, so even though that's the first thing that came to mind, I'll give you another.  I'm really, really clumsy.  I'm bad at walking across flat surfaces.  I fall down.  A lot.

7. Your dream job.

Great minds and all that.  I already answered this one in number 9 above. 

8. What is your biggest sociopolitical concern?

I want to say something really smart here, and there are a million thoughts in my head about this.  I could probably write a book about my (mainly uninformed) opinions of the welfare system, the government's regulations of food, gun control, and a dozen more, but I think I'll go somewhere wildly unpopular and say that as a country, we are failing our kids. Kids are going hungry, kids are not receiving quality educations, kids are not being taught to think for themselves, kids are being taught to expect to be rewarded for showing up.   Today's kids are going to be ill prepared to be tomorrow's leaders, and that is a scary, scary thing.

9.  Where and when would you go if you could travel through time?

There are so many things it would be fabulous to witness, but I have a special interest in the settling of the American west.  Those folks were tough as nails and endured unspeakable hardships, but they kept going.  I admire that kind of spirit so much, and I'd love to see it in action.

10. Are you adventuresome?

In a word - no. 

11. Creatively, what are you best at?  What are you worst at?

I'm creative with my words.  I'm creative at solving problems.  I am crafty and creative with things around the house.  I'm a fabulously creative cook. However, this skill does not translate AT ALL to dressing myself.  I see people who look put together all the time with their scarves and accessories and stuff, and I'm so envious, but I'm really unable to do it myself.

11 Questions from me to you:

1. If you could have any superpower, what would it be?

2. What's the one thing you wish you could change about yourself?

3. Someone hands you a million dollars and says you can spend it on anything except you and your immediate family.  What do you do with the money?

4. You're about to walk the green mile - what's your last meal?

5. What's the first thing you think of when you wake up every morning?

6. What is the one thing you think should be taught in school that isn't already?

7. What are five words other people use to describe you?

8. If you could know in advance the exact day of your death, would you?

9. Pirates or Ninjas.  Discuss.

10. If your life were made into a movie, what actor would play you? Why?

11. What's the most recent thing you did for the first time?


11 bloggers I nominate for the Liebster Award:

And the award goes to...

All of you!!!

Let's be real here.  I only have about a dozen regular readers and it would be so terribly rude to exclude just one, so if you are reading this - YOU WIN!!! If you do decide to participate, let me know so I can come and learn all about you! 

Thanks again Andrea!  This was fun! (And kind of hard.)

 

Vine: My latest social media obsession.

Really it's no secret that I probably ok, ok, DEFINITELY spend too much time online messing with social media.

"But all my friends live there," she whines."

Also, since R and I bit the bullet and got iPhones a few years back - something we both SWORE we didn't want and wouldn't do, by the way - it's POSSIBLE  that MAYBE I spend just a LITTLE too much time with it.

Oh, who the hell am I trying to kid?  My iPhone and I?  We're besties.  We're inseparable.  We're soul mates.  You won't get it away from me until you pry it from my cold, dead hands.  And even then, I'm planning to try to hold on to it so I can take it with me into the afterlife.

Heaven without my iPhone sounds a little too much like the other place, if you know what I mean.

So anyway, I'm now freely admitting to you that I know I have a problem.

"Hi, I'm mj, and I'm addicted to my phone."

"HI MJ!"

You would think that knowing is half the battle, and that I would limit myself, especially when it comes to getting addicted to new, interesting time-suckers.

But no, I'm not strong enough for that.

I first heard about vine on my Instagram feed, where all my bloggy friends were joking that they had crashed this new video app.  Ok, really, most of the people I follow aren't really my friends.  I just kind of stalk them a little bit.  They don't seem to mind, though.  Really.  I've only been blocked by a FEW of them.

Ahem.

I immediately downloaded it.

Because, you know, all the cool kids were doing it.

And I fell in love with it.   BIG SURPRISE!  MJ LOVES TIME-WASTING SOCIAL MEDIA!!!

But for real, it's cool.  It allows you to record video snippets that are a maximum of six seconds each.  You can either record it all at once, or you can start and stop, start and stop, start and stop, as many times as you want for the entire six seconds.

It's SO. MUCH. FUN.

Here's Cooper ready to blast off in his cardboard box rocket ship.

An impromptu storytime led by Zachary.

Some semi-impressive flying side kicks.

And this?  This is proof that my drinking is totally justified.

So yeah.  Now in addition to Facebook, Twitter and Pinterest, I've got yet another time-waster to enjoy.

And I highly recommend it.

Seriously, go download it.

Oh, and don't forget to follow me :) 

Sometimes I fancy myself a designer.

Long ago, in a land far, far away, I had a job as an HTML programmer/web page designer.

This was a wonderfully paying part time gig that I had in addition to my full time bookselling gig.

And I loved it.

But sadly, I wasn't particularly good at it.

Luckily for me, this was back in the dark ages of the internet (like 15 years ago), and nobody else knew what all this internet business was all about anyway.  I used other people's ignorance to hide a multitude of my own sins - namely, the fact that most of my design work was mediocre and lifeless.

"Oh, that's as good as it gets," I would lie cheerfully.  "The internet won't support what you're asking for."  The clients would shrug and agree, because even though I didn't know all that much, I surely knew more than they did.

That job fizzled out a few years later, but I have always missed the chance to be creative that way.  Occasionally, an opportunity will present itself to me and I can put a few of my old design skills (or lack thereof) to use.

I will never be a professional - not by anyone's stretch of the imagination - but I do love messing with design stuff from time to time, and occasionally I'm even kind of proud of it.  Recently I bullied my friend Natalie to give me access to her blog and I came up with this:

I think it's even cuter than my own blog, so now I'm jealous.  Of my own work.  Go figure.  Also, aren't her social media icons TO DIE FOR?  I mean, don't die really, but they ARE stinking cute.

Also, every year I design my own Christmas card.  I think this year's comic book themed one will be hard to top in years to come.  But I'm definitely going to try.

I did a little thing a while back for my husband's boss, and it turned out ok, too.

Don't you love my creative use of the word "void?"

And here's a logo I did for a school.  Pretty cute, huh?

So I'm not in the professional category by any means, but I do like to play around with stuff like this occasionally.  I'm going to add this to my ever-growing list of things that put me into the category of "jack of all trades, master of none." 

Sigh.  Someday I'm going to decide what I want to be when I grow up.

Stories to tell.

I have stories to tell.

Really.

They're piling up in my brain as we speak.

I want to tell you about how Natalie is making me run 50 miles this month, and I want to tell you about how there are serial killers everywhere, and about zj's new bed, and why I have a new enemy (squirrel, you know who you are!!!!).  I want to tell you these stories and a million more like them...

But every time I think I'll steal an hour to sit down and write, I think of a million more things I NEED to do, and SHOULD do, and some sort of perfect storm of productivity meets necessity has kept me from sitting at the computer at all this week.  And now it's Saturday at 6pm, and where the hell did my week go?!?!?!?

Rest assured, though.  I WILL find some time to write soon.

Like next week for sure.

Or at least the week after...

Why I blog.

A few weeks ago, I read this article about a blogger who had been removed from a paying blogging job for plagiarizing work from another blogger.

My first thought was "People get PAID to do this?  Sign me up."

My second thought was "Why would anyone knowingly steal someone else's words?"

I've been blogging on and off (mostly on) for over five years,  first at Keeping Up With Zackie, then for just a little while at my "secret" blog that never did really feel right to me, and now here.

And I love doing it.

Oh sure, I love the comments and feedback and I even love the technical side of it, but I can honestly say that for me, it's pretty much all about the words.

I love words, and I love telling stories that make people laugh.

Sometimes when I sit down to write the words pour out faster than my stubby little fingers can type them. Sometimes I keep going back and back and back to a sentence or paragraph, trying to find just the right word or turn of phrase to fit what I'm trying to say.

I'm constantly writing blog posts in my head.

Most of my best stuff has been written in the shower, on the treadmill or on the toilet.

The thing is, I've always had words swirling around in my head, and I can't NOT let them out.

When I was a kid I started keeping a diary, then graduated to a journal, and now to a blog.  The words, they have to have someplace to go, and even if I never got another comment or visitor or follower to my blog, I would keep writing it.

Because I have to.

So this chick, the one who stole somebody else's work and used it on her blog, I think she's missing the point.

And I feel kinda bad for her.

To Do:

Things NOT on my to do list this weekend:

1.  Complete blog redesign
2.  Take care of two sick boys
3.  Clean up puke

Things I did this weekend:

1.  Complete blog redesign

2.  Take care of two sick boys

3.  Clean up puke

Here's to a better week next week!

You probably would run screaming after 15 minutes.

Last week I saw a bunch of really cool posts linking to A Week in My Life by Adventuroo and I thought about doing it.

For about a minute.

Then, based on the fact that I didn't want to scare either of my readers off, I decided against it.

Truth be told, I'm not sure I want you guys to know what I do all day.  Um... Pinterest, anyone?  Also, since it has a tendency to be a little crazy around here pretty much every flippin' second of evert flippin' day from time to time, I wasn't sure I wanted to broadcast it.  But it kept calling to me.

Do me! Do me!


Oh my god, that was not meant to be as dirty as it sounds.  Really.

Finally I decided that I wouldn't try to do a whole day, just a short little span.

I do this all day long.  Surely you can handle 15 minutes, right?

So here's my Wednesday, from 3:30 pm - 3:45 pm.  Approximately, anyway.

3:30 pm:   Zj is just getting off the bus, and cj (in his stroller) and I are standing at the bus stop to meet him.

3:31 pm:  Still walking home from the bus stop.  Cj is yelling "More sucker me! Peassssee???" and zj is talking a mile a minute.  "And today we had YOGURT BOX for lunch! But I didn't like it.  So I ate some bread that was shaped like a fish.  It's ok, my friend gave it to me.  And guess what, Mama?  Today was HEALTH day!  And we learned about germs and..."

3:32 pm: We arrive home, I get the boys inside, everybody sheds shoes, jackets, backpacks, etc. and zj asks for a snack.  Cj: "NACK! NACK!"

3:33 pm: I procure some chips and salsa, and give it to the boys in the living room.

3:34 pm: The boys seem intent on eating their snack, so I wander off into the library (which is also known as Mama's Naughty Room, because it's where Mama goes when she needs a time out) to screw around on the internet, which I announce to the boys as "Mama is going to the library to do some VERY IMPORTANT WORK."

3:35 pm: Zj yells "Mama!  Cj is DRINKING the SALSA!"  Cj: "MOE SAUCE!  MOE SAUCE!"

3:36 pm: I determined that cj was indeed drinking the salsa.

3:37 pm: Clean up the salsa.  

3:38 pm: Clean up more salsa, which is inexplicably on the underneath side of the ceiling fan.

3:39 pm: I lose sight of zj for a second, then hear him yell from the bathroom "MAMA! Come look at how big this poop is!"

3:40 pm:  I go check on zj.  It is indeed a very large poop.  Lucky for you, I did NOT photograph it, even though zj was heartbroken that I would not.

3:41 pm: Spray some air freshener, then check to see what cj had gotten into. 

3:42 pm: Determine that cj had pulled all the toys off the shelves in his room.  Whew.  I got lucky there.  That, sadly, was the best case scenario.

3:43 pm: Pick up some of the toys, pausing long enough to yell "Zj, stop torturing your brother!" and "Cj, stop licking your brother!  You are not a puppy!"

3:44 pm: I determine that it's nearly 4 o'clock, which is damn close to 5 o'clock, and begin my own cry:

"MOE SAUCE!  MOE SAUCE!"

I’m sharing my awesome with Momma Made It Look Easy and you can too.

I'm such a bad blogger.

It's true.

I'm a terrible blogger.

I don't go to cool blog conferences.

I don't have a connected circle of blogs that I am a part of, and active in.

I seldom participate in link-ups.

I don't post on a regular schedule.

I almost never remember to promote my blog on any social media site, which is ok, considering I almost never remember to seek out followers on said sites.

Some weeks - or months - I'll be inspired and post nearly every day.

Other times, weeks will pass without a solid post.

I have good ideas for posts them immediately forget them.

Truthfully, I'd love to do all these things, but since blogging is something that I just do, just for me, it usually... ok, always takes a back seat to laundry and dinner and kissing boo-boos and playing outside and...

You get the picture.

So yeah, I'm a bad blogger.

Oh, and I never, ever, ever remember to check my stat counter.

Except occasionally.

A couple months ago Angie at the Jammie Girl posted an amusing look at what search terms brought people to her blog.

I thought "I should do that!" then immediately forgot all about it.

Till today.

 So today, in no particular order, I'm listing some of my favorites.  Keep in mind, these are the actual terms that some poor unsuspecting soul typed into Google or wherever hoping to get real information.

Instead they got me.

1. Pictures of a funny retail clerk:  Hmmm.  Do you think they meant "funny-looking?"  Or just funny?  Either way, I'm sure these folks were sorely disappointed.  Because I almost never post pictures of myself.  Well, except this one time.  Ok, maybe they weren't so disappointed after all.

2. Stubby toes: Ok, maybe I have overshared a little about the state of my feet, especially after a certain pair of unnamed shoes *cough* Brooks *cough* tortured me for 13 miles or so, but come on.  Stubby?  Really? That's just mean.

3. What to wear at amusement parks: Variations of this are among my top search results.  However, after many people spent time looking at this post, I'm sure amusement park ticket sales were way down.  Call me, Disneyworld.  Maybe we can work out a little... agreement.


4. Baby with hairy toes: Really, my first question here is why in the Hell would anyone want to look for that anyway?  My second question, of course, is why would that bring someone to my blog?

5. Smell my feet, or I'll step on you: This doesn't even make any sense.  I think I need a drink.

6. Little bastard kid: Hey, I was married when my kids were born! Stop being so judgey.

7. Zombie feet how to make them: Run 13 miles in poorly fitting shoes.  See?  This blog is totally informational.

At this point, I just stopped looking.

And I'm seriously considering just deleting Statcounter altogether.

But if I do that, whatever will I have to blog about?

Stupid circle of life and all that.

How to write an amusing blog post.

As we open the scene at 154 Hidden Court, it is mid-morning and cj and zj are working on a coloring project that is spread out all over the living room coffee table.  Crayons are everywhere.  Mj takes one last look to ensure the safety and well-being of the boys, then grabs her massive cup of coffee - Cinnamon Roll flavored - and sneaks away to the office.  She sits down at the computer, opens it up, and...


Cue ominous music.


Zj:  "Mama!  Cj won't share!  I want the green crayon because I'm coloring the Green Lantern and he's GREEN!  And cj won't give it to me!"


Mj sighs, gets up from the computer, and goes in the living room, where there are NO LESS THAN 15 different green crayons available to choose from.  She makes some deals, swaps some crayons around, no one is actively crying, so mj heads back to the computer.  She sits down, the wonderfully amusing blog post swirling around in her head, just BEGGING to be let out, and...


Sounds of the bathroom door opening, then a large SPLASH! followed by uncontrollable giggling.


Zj:  "Mama!  Cj threw something in the TOILET!  AND NOW HE'S TRYING TO FLUSH IT!  AND HE'S ALL WET!  WITH PEE WATER!  EWWWWW!"

Cj:  "Ewwwwwww!"

Mj sighs, gets up from the computer, retrieves the toy Ironman from the toilet, rinses it off, cleans water up off the floor, takes cj upstairs and changes his clothes and disinfects his toilet-germy hands.  As they come back down the stairs...


Zj:  "Mama, I don't want to color any more.  Can I play on the Wii?"


Cj: "Wii!  WHEEE!!!"


Mj picks up 4,923 crayons, mostly green, puts them away, and turns on the Wii.  As the boys begin to play Mario - Cj's remote doesn't have any batteries, by the way - she returns to the computer and begins to type.  This is going to be the best blog post ever!  The words are just pouring out!  


Zj:  "Mama!  Cj shoved something up his nose!  And I think it's a crayon!  And it's GREEN!"

Mj sighs, gets up from the computer, and extracts this from cj's nose:

In the middle of the crayon extraction, mj notices that her living room window looks... dirty?  Closer inspection reveals this lovely crayon drawing on the window:

Mj retrieves cleaning supplies and cleans the crayon off the window.  Meanwhile, zj has tired of the Wii and has wandered off to change into:

his Batman costume.  

Zj:  "Hey Mama.  You wanna play pretend?  You can be Catwoman." He is using his best cajoling, sing-songy voice.

Cj: "Nuh nuh nuh nuh nuh nuh nuh nuh Batman!"  singing the Batman theme song.  In his OUTSIDE VOICE.

Mj:  "Give me just five minutes to finish up what I'm doing, then we'll play, ok, guys?"

Disappointed sighs all around.

Mj wanders back to the computer, determined to finish the damn blog post.  Well, as soon as she checks Twitter.  And Facebook.  And Pinterest...

Twenty minutes later...

Zj:  "Mama!  Has it been five minutes yet?"

Mj sighs, hits the "Publish Post" button, even though she's not really pleased with what she's written, and goes to play pretend.

After all, she DOES get to be Catwoman.

Meow.

All the news that's fit to talk about.

Occasionally, ok, ONCE when I couldn't think of anything interesting to blog about, I Googled "blog post ideas" and decided I would write about the least worst one.

I chose "write a blog post about current news happenings."

Since no one actively criticized and/or stopped following me after that, I decided to do it again.

Hey, there's only so much original content left in the world, people.

Last time, I got my news stories from CNN.

This time, my news sources were a bit more... diverse.

Here we go.

Maine to legalize switchblades for one armed people.  Well, it's about time, Maine.

Norwegian boy saves sister from Moose attack using World of Warcraft skills.  There is nothing I could say about that to make it any better.

Sony CEO says Nintendo devices are "babysitting tools."  Two words:  Hell.  Yeah.

5 reasons to see Thor this weekend.  Really, I'm only interested in number one.  And I don't even really like blondes that much.  Mmmmmm... Vikings.....

Man lives off beer only for Lent.  Best. Sacrifice. Ever.  I'm totally going to a) become Catholic and b) do this next year for Lent.  Or maybe just for the hell of it.

Is bacon cologne proof that America's love affair with with the breakfast favorite has gone too far?  Well, yeah.  Personally, I love bacon flavored... er, scented men.  Nom, nom, nom, nom, nom, nom...

How to get drunk in the healthiest way possible.  With illustrations!  In case you're too drunk to read.

And there you have it, folks.

News, mj style.

You can thank me later.

Stream of Consciousness Sunday: About my impending vacation.

So, the J family is about to go on vacation.

One of the best perks of RJ's job is that his boss lets us use his condo on beautiful Pawleys Island for a week every year.  Actually, it's the only perk of his job, but whatever.

So, as is usual for me, I'm in pre-vacation panic mode.

My house has to be completely cleaned from top to bottom before we leave.

Because oh dear God what if we have a wreck and die a fiery death or get eaten by a band of killer sharks or eat some bad seafood or whatever and somebody has to come in our house and pack up all our shit and sees that I haven't dusted the baseboards or washed the windows since... oh, NEVER.

It's part of my particular brand of crazy.  It's just a part of my crazy, but it's a big part.

Also, every time zj sees me cleaning the toilets, he asks me if its going to be Thanksgiving soon.  Really, kid?  I clean the toilets more than once a year.  I promise.

So today I spent the day vacuuming, mopping and dusting in preparation for possibly dying on vacation.

I don't do taht before I, say, go to the grocery.

What would happen if I died when going to the grocery?

Something else to worry about, I guess.

But I'm really lookign forward to this vacation.  I love the beach, and I know the kids


Seriously?  My time's up?  Wow. I've learned a few important things on this, my first Stream of Consciousness Sunday, hosted by All Things Fadra - shameless plug - you're welcome.  1) I type REALLY slowly. That high school typing class I blew off in favor or French is looking better in hindsight.  2)My blog posts are typically anbout 50 times this long. 3) This was fun.  4)It's killing me not to fix the typos I see above, see CRAZY.  5)I think ALL my blog posts are stream of consciousness.  6)In the best Govenator voice I can muster, I'll be baaaaack.

It's just between you and I.

Mama Kat told me to write about my pet peeve.  Really, you only have to ask once.


Hypercorrection: Hypercorrection is what occurs when someone deliberately tries to avoid making an error in the use of language but overcompensates and in so doing makes another error.  Basically, it means you use grammar that sounds all fancy-like but is totally wrong.  

I literally got chills typing the post title.

I'll admit, I'm a bit of a grammar freak.

Now don't go at my post with your red pen and tell me I use too many commas or use an occasional sentence fragment or a run-on sentence or paragraphs that are too short.

I know.

I know the rules and break them on purpose, which is totally acceptable.

It's called a VOICE, people, and I'm slowly finding mine.

Anyway, bad grammar makes me wince, but nothing is as absolutely grating as hypercorrection.

When I hear that, it says to me that you WANT to sound educated, smart, and grammatically superior, but that you cannot be bothered to LEARN THE FREAKIN' RULES.

Let me give you an example.

"He invited Susie and I to the party."

 WRONG.

It should be:

"He invited Susie and me to the party."


Since we're on the subject, let me give you a few more examples of what NOT to do.

"Hypercorrection is the most irritating thing to we grammar freaks."


"A message came for he and I."


"Whomever said that you couldn't go?"


Should be:

"Hypercorrection is the most irritating thing to us grammar freaks."

"A message came for him and me."

"Whoever said that you couldn't go?"

Ok, I'll stop for now.  On the off chance that you haven't already quit reading this post and clicked over to something that's actually entertaining, like Charlie Sheen's latest antics, I'll leave you with this.

The shirt I just happened to be wearing as I wrote this post.
Be afraid.  Be very afraid.

The one where I pretend to be Catwoman.

Today, I'm guest posting at The Kennedy Adventures.  Be sure to drop by and say hi to my friend Dianna. Dianna and I go way, WAY back, like to when we were too-smart-for-our-own-good little girls in elementary school.  If you're here by way of The Kennedy Adventures, then folks, this is the rest of the story...

Zj is a bit obsessed with Superheroes.

For a while, his obsession was about everyone of the Marvel persuasion.

Lately, though, he's been on a bit of a DC kick.

He has absolutely no interest in anything that might some day be vaguely useful, like, say, READING, but he can tell you the names of all four people to fill the role of Robin, in order,  with a brief bio.  Mama's so proud.

If you don't know what any of that means, you clearly have girls living in your house.  But I'm not bitter.  Much.

Anyway, pretty much the only thing that can keep zj's attention for any amount of time, other than Benadryl, which knocks him RIGHT out, video games which I try to avoid for all but 14 hours a day, which we all know cause brain cancer, violent behavior and male pattern baldness, is to play pretend.

It goes something like this:

Zj: "Mama, I''l be Batman, you be Catwoman, and cj can be baby Robin."

Me: "Ok."  At this point, I'm still hopeful that this will be one of those games of pretend where I can get away with a well placed "Yeah" or "Uh-huh" and that will be all that's necessary.  Sadly, those times are getting fewer and further between...

Zj: "Catwoman, why did you steal all those jewels from the Gotham Museum?"

Me: "Uh, ok."

Zj: "MAMA! LOOK AT ME! WITH YOUR EYES!"

Me: Dammit.  I'm going to have to pay attention this time.  "Ok, Batman, I took the jewels.  Whaddya gonna do about it? Meow."  I like to meow randomly when pretending to be Catwoman.  It's called METHOD acting, people.


Zj: "Well Catwoman, if you wanna, maybe we could go out some time.  Ya know, like on a date?"   

Me: "Meow.  Ok Batman, I'll go on a date with you.  Where are you going to take me?"

Zj:  "Well, maybe we could go to the Gotham dance.  And go get cheeseburgers.  Here, I'll get yours.  What do you like on your cheeseburger?"

Me: "Um, ok? I like lettuce.  Meow."

Zj:  "Here's your cheeseburger with lettuce, Catwoman.  Now let's go to the dance." Pretends to get into the Batmobile and drives us to the dance.  "Um, Catowman, you need to go put your fancy dress on to go to the dance."

Me: Whaaa???  "Ok, Batman.  What does my fancy dress look like?  Meow."

Zj:  "Well, it's shiny, with sparkles, and a ribbon and a bow, and flowers.  And it has sparkles on it."

Me: I think you mentioned the sparkles... 


Zj: "Oh, and the shoes.  The shoes are the ones, ya know, that are big.  Like, ya know, tall, with points in the back."

Me: "MEOW? You mean high heels?"

Zj: "Yeah, and they have sparkles, too."


Awesome.  So now I'm raising a boy-child who has set the bar for future relationships at Catwoman wearing a sparkly dress and heels.  No pressure there.  I'm sure those types are a dime a dozen.

It's bad enough that he is clearly going to be a comic book geek.

Now, he's working on being a comic book geek with unrealistic expectations.

Well, Meow.

And that's all I have to say about that.