Suck It, Dude

I'm a parent who volunteers. Sometimes, I wish I were one of the parents who just drop their kids off and screech out of the parking lot to the nearest Starbucks. But I'm not. I play the roll of coach, leader, etc.... There are very few activities that my kids are involved in that I don't play some sort of roll as a volunteer.

I volunteer because I like to see what my kids are up to and I enjoy being a part of their interests. I usually have a great time, get to do fun things with my kids and see who they are hanging out with. I am currently volunteering for my daughter's drama production. While I signed up for several very specific areas, I was mostly interested in set production and I've shown up for 2 weekends to build a set. It is driving me crazy that there is no "plan" in place here! We show up and the theater kids are spending their time socializing, not working. Not to mention that the adults are helpless without direction. When a job finally becomes apparent, there are so many bored people that jump in to assist that it becomes annoying. Does it really take 3 people to screw in 6 screws? No, but there is not a job list, there is not a direction, there is not a vision and it is driving me batty! The drama director has it all locked up in his head and by the time he tries to show you what he wants, he has basically done it for himself. BAHHHH!!

I'm appalled by the lack of architectural integrity that is going into this project - things are unstable (which I've pointed out several areas of concern) and the work is shoddy. I realize that we are all just trying to pull something together with a very little amount of money, but the reality is that if the project had some real planning and thought it could be spectacular - and stable! The director has asked me to come in on 2 occasions to do some paperwork for him, and both times I have shown up he was not ready for me. An email or phone call could have saved me a trip!!

I'm wasting my time left and right with this guy and I want to tell him exactly what I think of him, but I don't. I'm often reluctant to voice my opinions to teachers in fear of my child becoming a 'target'. I would never hold my thoughts on any serious matter, but the fact that I think this guy is a total disorganized, pathetic leader is something that I hold my tongue on. I want to scream at him that he pales to invisibility when compared to his predecessor, I want to shout at him that he has no business leading a group of 30+ preteen girls and how he has absolutely not one frickin' clue on how to handle the real 'drama' that these girls are going through just because of their age. But, for now and for the sake of saving my child the embarrassment, I must keep my mouth shut and continue to waste my time piddling around this prick's idea of production!! The show must go on!

I hate Doctors

Please don't take this personally if you are a medical doctor, but if you are, I hate you. Which in itself is kind of funny. When I met Hunk, he was a Pre Med student well on his path to Physicianhood. Is that a word? I almost MARRIED a doctor, and I hate them!!

My grandmother always told me I should marry a doctor because I'm so independent. She honestly felt like I would never be able to conform to any sort of committed relationship, but if I insisted she said it must be a doctor - because they are never at home and I would pretty much be on my own! Ha!

Why do I hate doctors? I don't know!! I really do not hate them, I just seriously dislike going to see them. I have a bit of a phobia I suppose. I will wait until the grim reaper is knocking on my door before I will schedule a doctor's appt. I will only see a doctor if I have come to a firm conclusion that whatever I have is not going to go away without a prescription. Luckily, I have been relatively healthy and have not had too much of a need for medical intervention. Pregnancy and birth for my two children were, by far, the most traumatic experiences of my life - and it was all due to the fact that I had to go to a doctor's office so often!! Forget the vomit, forget the stretchmarks, forget the tearing of flesh and excruciating pain - I frickin' HATED the doctor's office visits, every month, then every two weeks, then every week!!! OHHHH the horror......

I am telling you all of this because I am not feeling so healthy at the moment. I haven't felt really good in quite a while, and yet, I don't want to go to the doctor. Yeah, I know it's stupid. I know that I am anemic in a really bad way. I take iron supplements (when I remember), but I am still just soooo tired ALL the time. I'm so drained and I wonder sometimes if I'm depressed. Some days I feel like a robot, somedays it's a challenge to just move around. I don't feel sad, but I just don't feel like doing anything. I'd be really happy to just put up a hammock under a tree and stay in it all day (with a fully charged iPhone....). Probably, I'm just overly busy. We do a lot of stuff around here and I never feel like I'm caught up on the laundry, the bills, the food, the menus, the homework, the volunteer positions, the sports, the charities, the business, the, the, the.....I could go on for days. I think I'm feeling the weight of the world, and it's draining the life out of me. I should probably see a doctor about that....

Celebrate

I love a good party, so I volunteered to have a Disney Celebration in my home from the Mickey Moms Club. They sent me a big red box full of fun things to have any sort of celebration I wished.

The first order of business was to decide what we should celebrate. My first thought was Halloween, since that is the closest holiday, but we decided against it since it was still two weeks out. We had a Celebration of Girls. Basically, we got out all the princess stuff, fluff and paint and celebrated that we are girls! I put out princess dresses for modeling and we had a princess cake - which is really easy! Bake your cake in a bowl, turn it upside down and shove a doll in it.

The Mickey Moms Club sent games, activities and goodie bags to give away, so that was all taken care of. We watched the Disney vacation DVD and dreamed about our next getaway to the Kingdom - a girls trip, no doubt! Everyone left really excited....and ready for a trip!

Camp Out

I was lucky enough to go camping this past weekend. The weather turned out to be pretty good, not near as much rain as we expected and the temperature was just right the entire time.

This camping trip was for Girl Scouts and we ended up taking 21 girls. About half of them had never camped before and I must say that they all did SO good. We slept in Platform Tents, which if you don't know what that is - ummm, ICK! I am a big fan of the ZIP UP tent. I can control what is coming in and out of my tent. Platforms are basically wood decks with a canvas tent around it. The front, back and corners are all just tied together with ropes. It's like a flap tent that never fully closes. Upon our arrival, which was in the dark (we had to wait until school was over to leave, then a long drive, bad GPS, etc) I went to my platform and scoped it out with my flashlight - spiders in every corner, leaves and a ROACH! I can handle a lot of things, but roaches are not one of them. I 'almost' put up my hammock and just slept outside. But I plowed through and acted big for the girls. We have two Army issue mosquito nets which I always use for platform camping. The thing is that this was the first trip that I had BOTH of my girls and each one of them wanted a bug net. This left me out in the cold. I tried to share one of the nets with my littlest girl, but it was just shy of being big enough. I spent most of the two nights wondering if something was crawling on me.

The age range of the girls was 7 - 13, the little ones were SO EXCITED. I decided to split up the ages and do separate things with them and, by far, the most fun was the Canoeing for the little ones. Many of them had never canoe'd before and they did fantastic and they learned so much. And got SO WET! It was the best!

I had to push past the fact that half of me did not want to be there, at all. Hunk had been away for the week and I had to leave for this trip as soon as he got home. We weren't on bad terms while he was away, but it was just off and things were just empty for me. I didn't want to leave, but I had to so it was another 3 days of separation. It was hard to put on the happy face all weekend, but I did.

We finally got our "time" on Sunday - late - but it was good to finally just be together and figure out why I was feeling so apart. Things are fine now, but it would just be so much easier if I could just SAY what I'm always feeling. I don't want to do that, I want him to read my mind and figure it all out, it just feels like it's not as genuine if I have to TELL YOU. Yanno?

Anyhoo, all is well now. And I'm ready for another camping adventure, this one just wet my whistle. Unfortunately, our weekends are chock full until the cold weather will appear, so I think I'm going to have to wait until spring. Boo!

HP Premium Touchsmart Web Printer

I was the lucky winner of an HP Printer from the blog of Anissa Mayhew. Somehow, Anissa has convinced HP to drink her kool-aid, she has printers to give and they even have her set up to host parties with her Aiming Low friends in swanky towns like Boston and New York. So, if you ever get the pleasure of meeting Anissa, note that she is a lovely person, a wonderful mother and friend and that she has a stash of HP SWAG - so make her share!!

My totally FREE printer arrived directly from HP via the super hot FedEx man. I wasn't expecting it, and I thought he was delivering my new hearing aid. I was working in the yard when he pulled up and he asked if he could carry it to the house for me. And, I'm like, dude, it's a hearing aid it can't be that heavy. And he's all, no m'am, it's BIG, upon which I peeked inside his truck and saw the glorious HP logo and I screamed. Just a little bit. Which made him think I was a little bit wonky.

So, it had arrived! Hunk was out of town and so I texted him that "IT's HERE"! Which proceeded to make him very jealous because he loves to open boxes that contain new gadgets/electronics. Since I was preparing to leave town myself I didn't have time to open my new printer right away. I had a crazy schedule which I was trying to accomplish a list a mile long and basically, Hunk was to arrive home, just in time to give me a high five on my way out of town. Since I wanted to be the one to open MY printer, I had to wake up an hour earlier the next day so that I could fit in time to piddle with it. At the crack of dark o'thirty, I was opening up my new box. And I took pictures because I was so excited. Dude, the thing was FREEEE!

My first view is of all the cables, which are neatly packed into a reusable bag - I thought that was super cool. THEN, oh then, I found that the ENTIRE printer was packed in a bigger reusable bag! The bag is amazingly large and I promptly filled it with stuff and took it out of town with me! So the entire printer was packaged in like 90% reusable/recyclable product. There were only two pieces of styrofoam and virtually no plastic. I have to say, this makes me happy.

I have only one complaint with the print cartridges. Instead of just having a tape across the well there is a piece of orange plastic that must be twisted off before they can be installed. It seems like a waste of a lot of plastic, they are pretty bulky. Additionally, on one of them I twisted it off and it left some remnants as it wasn't a clean break. I wondered if it would still sit properly in the ink carriage (so far it seems okay).

The printer was a breeze to set up, basically you just plug it in and then hit the button to search for wireless, put in your password and watch the magic happen. I then put the CD in my PC and let it do it's thing and I was ready to print in no time, which was good because I had a zillion pounds of paperwork to finish before leaving for my trip. So, my first use of the printer was for plain jane printing. I was racing against the clock and so once it was set up I just started cranking out the paperwork that I needed. And did I mention that it's wireless, so I was able to put the printer in the office and still be able to work from the kitchen.

Flash forward to today, this has been my first opportunity to play with the web applications on the printer. They are very cool. There are things like school papers, which isn't an entirely new concept for an HP Printer, but nonetheless it is an important app. I've found that I can check the weather - or have my kids check it before getting ready for school. My younger daughter has apparently figured out the Nickalodeon & Disney fun pages because I keep finding little projects all around the house. She is happy to print and entertain herself, which is cool that she doesn't have to log onto a website to print fun stuff. I also don't have to worry that she might make a typo and end up somewhere other than Disney or Nick. Believe me, with kids, the typos happen and they can see stuff that kids should not see.

I can log onto my snapfish.com albums without using my PC at all, the printer can access my account and allow me to print photos right there. I've found that I can print my own tabbloid to read - it will pull from websites like Jezebel, Engadget, The Big Picture, etc. and you can decide how many pages you want to read. Since I use my iPhone so much, I'm not likely to use tabbloid, but it is interesting and who knows... I can print from my iPhone which is all kinds of awesome. And there are recipes and coupons and games, and and and and....the possibilities are endless. I imagine the choices for apps will grow, much like the iPhone apps until I can do virtually anything directly from my printer.

I have no complaints for the printer itself, it is sleek and extrememly functional. It has all the features of most printers with the fax, copy, scan, but with the addition of the Web Apps it is quite a step further into convenience. Our household has 3 laptops, but we still manage to end up with someone needing a PC when there isn't one available and this printer can help with that. Hopefully the app developers will take this printer to even more amazing levels! I am waiting patiently for the app that will print out the missing sock.

A new addition

We have a new addition to our family. Oh God NO, I am not pregnant - people I am old and my eggs are shriveled, if I had a baby it would look like Benjamin Button!

Anyhoo, we have a new cat, sort of. We've had her since August 16 I just haven't talked about her. With good reason.

One week prior to getting "new cat" was the day that my cat "Ashley" disappeared. I was devastated, and so was my other cat "Emmie". Some friends of ours thought that it would ease our pain to give us this kitten(ish) that they found while camping the weekend of the 16th. So, they brought her home, and with all of the best intentions, gave her to us. We found her to be about 8 months old, full of ear mites and very hungry and scared. I agreed to keep her and thought it might be a good distraction for "Emmie" to have a little cat to boss around. "New Cat" looks A LOT like "Emmie" and so my kids, who are extremely creative and thoughtful, named her "Emma". Yeaahhh, that took a ton of brain power........

Now that "Emmie" is gone as well (and we do have a theory on that one)....."Emma" is our cat, sort of. She lives here, but she doesn't really like us. I'm trying really hard to like her, but I feel guilty that she is here - I'd rather have Ashley and Emmie back. I never wanted to replace them, and this is what it feels like. I think that if they are looking down on us, they see that they were replaced swiftly and thoughtlessly. This is the farthest from the truth.

"Emma" needed a home, and I am happy to give her one. We still have a long way to go in building a relationship though. She is not cuddly in the least, will never be held and if you sit near her, she gets up and moves away. In short, she is a snob. She has come out of her shell in the playful department, she really enjoys biting and attacking us - along with anything else that dares to move which is to be expected with such a young cat. It's a transition for me, and for her. I'm hoping it works out for the best, she can be really cute, but it passes very quickly.

As far as the fate of "Emmie", my mom reported that we have a coyote hanging around. This leaves me with all sorts of grisly thoughts about my poor kitty, but I can hope that it was fast and painless if that was his match. It's hard to gain closure when you never really know. My hearts goes out to anyone with a missing child, I can not even fathom the daily struggle and torture of the wondering.

It's not FAIR!

I'm usually pretty easy going, I don't get too rattled about stuff - except within my own house, and then crap will fly if you leave a wet towel on the floor, or look at me sideways. Anyway, in the big world I don't typically sweat the small stuff, and many of my friends would say that I am pretty laid back. I don't lose my head if things go awry at school, work, sports, etc. I'm typically fine to be along for the ride and if you screw something up, I'm trying to downplay it so that you don't feel so bad.

But some things, just make me mad. And they are so stupid, and so petty and I feel like such a moron for it. Mostly these things are when people who are super shitty seemingly spend their lives walking on beds of roses. Now, I know that everyone has their demons, their problems and their hidden woes - nothing is all how it seems on the outside. I guess what I'm getting at is that I don't like to see these people succeed, in anything. Yeah, like I said, PETTY. I'm being it.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not walking around wishing the plague on anyone. I don't hope they contract horrible diseases, or die a fiery death. But I just can't be happy for certain people when things go their way. When I hear good news, or stories of success, about someone that I know is a total douche it just pisses me off. I hate this about myself, because I don't want to walk around loathing certain people, but if you are a bottom feeder, I prefer to see you staying at the bottom.

Of course, the universe doesn't exist so that all the happy, fun people can get ahead. I don't know WHY the universe exists, but that's not it. The universe is perfectly happy to see the backstabbers and the manipulators get ahead. What I have to realize is the DEFINITION of "ahead". Maybe, what I see as their success is covering a much deeper problem (I can HOPE!). Maybe, I need to quit thinking that "ahead" means this, this and this.....

I just feel like a loser, because someone I know is reporting all kinds of happiness, bunnies and unicorns in her life. And in my heart, I know that she is a total wanker, and I don't like her. And to hear of her success, just pisses me off. I'm stamping my foot and screaming in my head that it just isn't FAIR!

Think me shallow, much?