I'm An Animal

I just took this test (what's your inner animal) on Tickle.

Judy, you're a Tiger in the wild world of love.

Grrrr. Go get 'em, Tiger! You know what you want and how to get it. And with your powerful stealth and impressive attitude — who are we to tell you otherwise? You're a natural predator in the lush jungle of love. With plenty of poise, power, and perfect timing, you'll charm the pants off any target you set your sights on. You've got beauty and grace that's irresistible to most who cross your path. Your territory is so well marked, it's not surprising that you sometimes can be a bit of a loner instead of hanging with the pack.

Sophisticated and discriminating, you set your standards high when out hunting for love. Trendy new hot spots are probably your typical habitat — though any place you can find sleek, beautiful mates is good in your book. Your confidence and charm will certainly get your partner purring. And whether it's your bold patterns or the stealthy way you pounce, there's just something people can't resist about you.

heh... funny, no wonder I like meat so much. ;o)

What The Hell Is Wrong With Me???
Don't answer that, don't make me bitch slap you!

Sheesh, I've been so side tracked this morning I just realized I haven't had a cup of coffee yet! *wanders off to make a delightful cup*

*45 minutes later*
I think I'm ready for my second cup now. It's a crazy morning. I think Super Girl senses that her winter break is nearing the end so it's necessary to be as crazy as possible.

*later*
Fuck, this has taken me over 2 hours to write this much... Will have to try again later.

what's this?


Why it's Spider Man! At least that's what Cabbage Patch swears. Who am I to argue with her artistic interpretations?

CATS


My cats are being tolerant of me. My camera batteries are fully charges - all ready for the New Years Eve party.

Handfull of Rodents


My rodents are cohabitating now. It happened last Friday. It had to happen as Hanta had chewed an escape hole in her tiny cage. Well let me start from the beginning to tell the whole all to damn cute and sickeningly sweet story. I got up about 9:30 am or so as K was off work and he said I could sleep in and he'd keep the Tiny Terrorists busy while I slept. An offer to sleep in is RARE so I took him up on it and directed Chaos and Destruction upstairs to wake him when they burst into my room at 7:30 am.

When I finally awoke to a oddly quiet home, I found my newest gerbil in the gerbil ball on the living room floor. I instantly started making plans on how to inflict unbelievable suffering on K if he had left my gerbil in the ball and he'd left to meet with his friends. I got Hanta out of the ball and put her in her cage. After putting the gerbil ball away I turned to discover Hanta's head peeking out of the cage. Oh! My mental list of suffering was put on hold as I pondered what to do next. Hanta was now standing on her cage sniffing Bea's cage. I decided it was time to see if the gerbils would get along. I highly anticipated another gerbil death match and didn't get my camera but did prepare to separate tiny rodents. I opened Bea's cage and Hanta imediately walked in, Bea met her and to my surprise she licked her instead of tried to tear her little head off. Since that moment there has been much cute gerbil love and gerbil cuddling. Bea follows Hanta around a lot and they snuggle together in the nest. It's very cute.

Oh and I didn't get to finish my list of mysery for K as he walked the door just a few moments after I had shut the cage of gerbil love. When he discovered Hanta's escape hatch he had hightailed it to Petsmart to get a new cage and some connecting tubing as he thought the gerbils weren't prepared for cohabitation yet. Alls well that ends well.

Pity Party

Warning, you are about to enter my pity party, guaranteed to be absolutly selfserving and self centered.

Have you ever felt desperately alone? Do you remember what it was like to feel like you weren't part of any group in high school? Feel like maybe the only reason you were invited along was out of pity? Yeah that's where I'm at right now. I'm feeling acutely isolated. I really hate that.

I feel like some people who were very close to me are pulling away, wanting me to disapear from their lives. Just not calling when they said they would, not talking to me much anymore... I guess I'm easy to forget or annoying enough to want to forget.

I'm trying to make more friends, but even there I'm not sure I'm doing so well. I don't really think certain people really like me all that much. I think I try to hard and come off as desperate - I think that's probably true in all areas of my life. I had friends I would talk to all the time, every day and late into the night. Now I'm lucky if they answer me when I message them. Maybe I should just stop trying. Just give everyone what they want and leave them the hell alone.

I'm not sure why I'm going through this right now. I haven't felt this way since high school and now this is so foreign yet so familiar. Part of me says "fuck it, i'll go be a hermit. If people want me they'll let me know, just give up." the other part of me wholeheartedly disagrees and says to keep trying, but I'm not sure I'm up for more rejection. I don't know why I feel so alone and friendless, I think I'm a nice enough person, I bathe regularly, I don't think I'm frightening looking, I don't know, maybe I'm just not good enough.

That's my bigest fear in life, that I'm not good enough. Maybe I'm just not good enough to be anyone's friend, not good enough to be part of anything, my efforts just aren't good enough, my work is never good enough. I think that's it, I'm just not good enough. Alright then, I suppose I should start looking for a place to live out my life as a hermit and develop a love for owning multiple cats or dogs or something. Isolation is probably better than rejection.

No worries, I'm just really, really sad and lonely right now. I'll be fine tomorrow and I'll write some of my normal stupid things to entertain all 3 of you who read this blog.

Time To Prepare

Now that the December holidays are done, it's time to prepare for the most important day of the year. No not New Year day silly. Elvis' Birthday! Elvis Day!!!


January 8th marks the incredible day. Elvis Day! I do my damnedest to celebrate every year. I feel it is my duty as a white trash Southerner to make sure that my progeny learn about the great one, Elvis. So we celebrate Elvis Day. What other holiday involves eating as much fried food as one can humanly consume.... (hmmmm... wait... that's kind of like Hannukah... maybe... Elvis... was... a... JEW!! heh {actually some accounts of his druged out and paranoid end days include him converting to the Jewish faith}) Anyway, fried foods, sequined jumpsuits and Elvis movies! I'm petitioning for Elvis Day to become a national holiday. Why not? Elvis is as american as Velveeta cheese and monster trucks. There really needs to be a national holiday just for trailer trash redneck people. I urge you to join me in my celebration of ELVIS DAY - pull out your sequined jumpsuit and swing by KFC on your way home for that big bucket of extra cripsy (don't forget your sides of biscuits, taters and extra gravy!), head over to Blockbuster to rent your favorite Elvis Movies. Elvis Day is a day for family so everyone pile up on the couch to eat KFC, drink beer and watch as many movies as you can. *note: popping pills, shoting the TV and having heart attack on the toilet are not recommended optional activities - although they would add to the authenticity of the evening*

Mark your calendars! Elvis Day is 11 days away!

2004 Holiday Letter

Happy Holidays! As usual for the past few years I've been to freaking lame to mail out Chanukah/Christmas cards and tuck in a cute little holiday letter informing peeps of my year (hell just the delima of trying to decide which holiday to represent with the cards is enough to make me need a drink, best to just say to hell with it all and save the postage). Again as usual I'm doing it here on the blog. (I'm not sure I did do it last year, maybe... I know I did it at least one year). So here it is. Just pretend you got it in the mail.

Dear Friends and Family and Internet;

Wow what a year it has been! A Good year! Husband is still gay. Kids are good. Life is good. AND I met the most amazing man in the world and fell madly in love with him. Yup, that's the best part. After 2 years of seeing the same guy (Home Depot), we broke up abruptly at the begining of January. Thanks to D I met XXX a few weeks later and was instantly smitten. Really I was, the moment I saw him - despite me telling myself to get a GRIP, shit like this only happens in movies and romance novels, I still was floating. I dumped all other guys I was dating after that. He really is amazing, I just think about him and smile. He's smart, he's funny and he's incredibly sexy. And I feel incredibly lucky to have him as my boyfriend.

What else? I mean what else could there be other than an amazing man in my life, fabulous sex (with a live person, not just electronic pleasure devices) and intelectual stimulation? Oh yeah, the Little People.

Super Girl started kindergarten. I was aprehensive at first, me being the overprotective mother that I am worried that she would not do well and would not like school (actually it was my own anxieties from my own horrific kindergarten experience). The first day we took her to school and she just about gave us the bums rush out of the school. So much for her not adjusting. Cabbage Patch however wailed the moment we turned to go. She wanted to stay with Super Girl. *sigh* Back home she continued to ask when Super Girl would be home, which just broke my heart. 3:30 pm couldn't come soon enough for either of us. It took 30 minutes waiting in the pick up line to get Super Girl. That alone made me certain that I wanted her riding the bus. The next day was the First Day On The Bus. Again I needed to take calming deep breaths to deal with that, but despite my paranoid fears NOTHING happened and at 3:40 pm she exited the bus beaming from ear to ear. Eventually I realized that school is a fabulous thing. For half of the day I have one less child to make a mess! One less mess maker! AND she is LEARNING! Woohoo! So that's where my tax dollars are going. I think back to the moments of insanity as a new mother when Super Girl was just a baby and how I swore I would home school her. HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA! What was I thinking???? I am so not cut out for that crap. Anyway, she loves school and continues to shock me with how much she's learned.

Cabbage Patch is totally loving not having her sister home most of the day now. She talks non stop these days, and since her sister, who also talks non stop, but much louder, is gone half of the day, I can actually hear that what she is saying (although much of it is still in that alien toddler language so I don't always understand what she's saying). Her newest BIG words that come out so clear are IRRITATING as in "Super Girl stop that." "Why?" "Because it's irritating." and DISGUSTING as in "Get your finger out of your nose, that's disgusting." I'm glad she listens to me sometimes.

We've had some funny moments with the Little People. Like when Super Girl brushed her teeth with Personal Lubricant. heh or Cabbage Patch winning Jenga by putting all the blocks in the milk jug. They've covered them selves in baby powder prompting me to think of the Cingular commercial with the "Flour the children" line. There was the missing fish (that mystery was NEVER solved) and the tragic mass suicide of the entire tank of fish. My brunch with my former high school nemisis (who is no longer a nemisis so I really need to find something else to call her). Super Girl getting sick in the middle of the night and throwing up in her sisters bed (that's funny because I didn't have to clean that one up). I made a most fabulous costume for my sister for her first year on Scarby Cast and I had a fun time attending Scarby when I could. We had a fabulous Seder with lots of Kosher wine (and weird pictures). My cat took a week long vacation from us, but for some insane reason she CAME back. Crazy feline. Saw Jesus in my 'hood driving around in his pimped out silver Cadilac Escalade. In one fabulous evening with XXX I managed to set my hair on fire (setting out the candles for the romantic mood - he never knew about that), impress him with my fine choice of wines by asking him to open it and having it discoverd that the wine was a screw top and finally in an attempt to impress him with a lovely breakfast having smoke pouring out of the oven (one should really check the oven before turning on the broiler). Amazingly he didn't laugh and he's still my hot and sexy boyfriend. Angry Albino Sock Monkey was created! My EVIL creation LIVES! (still for sale, ya want one, you know you do - give me money and I'll give you monkey) I got my braces off (YAY!). I have had several fabulous visits to XXX and hopefully 2005 holds several more fabulous visits. Since I'm a chicken shit and usually travel via Greyhound I've been fortunate enough to meet several freaks on the bus - I figured out early that it's best to find your freak as opposed to having a freak find you. It works out well and makes for an intesting ride most times (last time with the drunk who was hitting on me was more irritating and less interesting). I had the absolute worst 'garden' this year, maybe 2005 will be the year of plastic plants for me. I got a lovely case of poison ivy - on my face! Got coffee makers for my birthday. Blessed are those who feed my addiction. Koko the gorilla (my birthday twin) was a bitch and stood me up for our usual birthday drink - bitch. The wee ones visited Grandma and GiGi for a week and came back convinced I had somehow shrunk our cats (their cats are huge, my cats are the compact verson) - it took 3 weeks to convince them that I did NOT shrink out cats. The higher powers sent a gerbil to us, which I dubbed Bubonic Plauge, Bea for short. I lost my drivers license at the end of August only to have the grocery store (who I had called three times in the week after I lost it) call me in October to tell me they had it. I cooked a meal for 35 people (a reception dinner) and it was FABULOUS. I pondered why my cats couldn't speak, then realized I'd be driven crazy by them if they could. I had the great hair disaster where I accidentally colored my hair a deep plum color - it looked shitty. Partied with The Queen on his birthday. Drank to much and flashed the party. I've managed to read two books this year - TWO whole books! Wooohoo! My celing fan in my living room was finally fixed! It only took 4 or 5 months. I did some illustrations and went to the GAYEST Halloween party ever! (It was a gay/lesbian parents group party) Had an impromptu party at our place (and it ROCKED!) - go check out the photos back in October to see my and Petey's progression to drunkeness. Thanksgiving was busy - cooked too much and ate too much. December brought Hannukah and the Little People LOVED that. Christmas followed - again the Little People LOVED all the pressies. In between all that I got a mother of a ticket (which I have to head to the court house tomorrow to arrange to take care of it). I've been cranky most of this month - lack of XXX does that to me, but now I'm looking forward to January (gonna visit my hot sexy man soon!) and 2005. I'm pretty damn sure it will be better than 2004.

How Sweet It Is

I've been baking this evening. I made the mistake of deciding to make Reindeer Brownies in addition to the other goodies I've been baking for K's family. Reindeer Brownies are just brownies decorated with M&M's and pretzels to look vaguely like reindeers. Mmmmm brownies. Frosting. M&M's. I had a Dr. Pepper with dinner too. I'm on a serious sugar high. I think I can feel my hair growing. I vibrating.

What's Wrong With This Picture?

A special prize goes to the first person to correctly answer the above question for THIS picture.

The Day That Lasted For 48 Hours
Or
Where Is That Childrens Chewable Valium????

Today started out fine enough. My progeny allowed me to sleep just past 8 am. A rare and sweet occurance that I treasure as I'm usually up at 6 am. Everyday. 6 am everyday. Let's all say that together now - 6 AM EVERYDAY. Okay, I think you get the idea.

Sleeping in to such a late hour left me with a false sense of security and confidence for a calm and peaceful day. Heh, foolish me. Having both of my offspring home all day is never calm nor peaceful. Usually it's not so bad, but it's also not usually raining at 8 am with the temperatures at a delightful 38 and the promise it plummeting with a 'wintery mix' (winter mix in this case means cold rain then sleet and finally soggy snow and freezing temperatures, i.e. hell for those who the night before were planning to take aforementioned offspring outside to burn off energy and save sanity). The Little People continued to perpetuate my delusion of a 'calm and peaceful day' by requesting and eating a breakfast of scrambled eggs and juice. This is an ultimate rarity as scrambled eggs are usually met with twisted up little faces and whines of "ewwwww! I don't like scrambled eggs! Can't we have cereal?"

After eating their breakfast and playing with Barbie and her bitch Ken while mommy checked e-mail... no wait, scratch that, while mommy cleaned viruses off her computer (more on that later), the Little People investigated the tapping noise on the window. The tap, tap, tapping noise was none other than the start of sleet. Sudden excitement insued as they mistook the tiny balls of ice accumulating in the planters for snow. The door was opened a few times for their curiousity to be satisfied. Back to Barbies.

Then it happened, I entered the first level of hell. Near 10 am the sleet changed to SNOW. Big fluffy flakes. Somehow the Little People knew it was snowing without even seeing. I starting hearing squeals of "It's snowing!" and requests to go out and play. This worked briefly to my advantage to get them to pick up the thousands of tiny Barbie accessories littering my living room floor - "Well you have to pick up your stuff before we can go out and play." Then it all went to shit. It was now time to round up winter clothing. For some reason all of the nice winter accessories like hats, scarves and gloves were not where they were supposed to be. So the quest for the missing gloves began.

Glove quest.

Now I personally have bought no less than 8 pairs of gloves (well 7 and one set of mittens). Last month I bought two pair in preparation for the cold weather. This morning, one hot pink glove and one red glove. I told the progeny that they had to find gloves - them not me. This also worked briefly to my advantage as I told them that I was fairly certain that at least ONE glove was in the dress up bins, hence they would have to CLEAN the toy area to find gloves. By noon it was nap time and after many reminders that no one could go play until two sets of gloves were found and many threats were issued through clenched teeth (mine) a black glove was found, a black mitten was found and a light pink glove was found. 5 hand coverings, that works. Off to naps.

Coat? What coat?

After short naps (DAMN!) Hell resumed, this time I was on a much deeper level having taken the express elevator as directed by my offspring. The tiny terrorists wanted to go out even more now. I asked a simple question "where is your coat Super Girl?" "I dunno." Grrrr... After 2 hours of me telling her to LOOK FOR IT, it was determined her coat is NOT in the house. Not happy now. Very NOT happy. But it's workable. I start dressing the kids for playing outside in the now 28 degree temperatures (19 with the wind chill) and ask yet another seemingly simple question "Where is your hat Cabbage Patch?" "I dunno." Damn it.

I saw the freaking hat just yesterday. I don't know what they did with it. I told them that if Cabbage Patch did NOT have a hat, then no one would go out to play in the snow. It took them a half an hour to actually go up stairs and find the damn hat. at 4:30 pm with hats, mismatched gloves, warm clothing and scarves, we ventured out into the weather to play. We returned at 5 pm to have hot chocolate and peanutbutter crackers. I hate snow almost as much as I hate snow days.

Let It Snow! Let It Snow! Let It Snow!
But Fer Fucks-Sake Make It Stop In Dallas!

Fuck it's snowing here. I dislike snow. Snowing in Dallas means dangerous driving conditons. And cold. I don't like to be cold and since my sweetie is far, far away from me, I don't even have someone to snuggle with under the covers. *pout*

Stop Snowing Damn It! Okay, I feel better.

Damn The Other Grandparents!!
Or What An Incredibly Shallow Bitch I Am.

So K has been finalizing plans with his family regarding our X-mas get together. This means gift exchange. *sigh* This usually means more crappy toys for my offspring. This year at the annual Thanksgiving thing the grandparents requested ideas on what to get for my offspring. I generally ask that people NOT get my progeny toys as the house already looks like I've robbed a toy store. I rattled off a list of acceptable DVDs to get for the kids. I did this as last year Grandpa H managed to give the progeny the most horrible and horendously awful gifts - two talking books (one that expecially annoying purple fiend) and a DVD *"the Great Longneck Migration". Now the real bitch as far as awful presents is that KIDS LOVE THEM! If you as a parent have the urge to jab red hot spoons in your ears every fucking time you hear it (because they are always noisy), then your offspring will LOVE it. And by love I mean play with it to the exclusion of everything else, I mean drag it everywhere they go, I mean hold on to it for dear life every time you even attempt to take it away (for a moment's peace and to make it 'disapear'), I mean they will take it to bed with them for safe keeping, I mean they use it drive the very last particle of sanity out of your very being, that kind of LOVE (obsession).

The list I gave was short and included things I KNEW I could tolerate and one thing I absolutly LOVE. I listed Barbie movies (which do suck but I can ignore and it totally mesmerizes them for about 15 - 20 minutes) and Shrek 2 (I figured asking for Spiderman 2 would be to obvious that it was for me and not them). K spoke to his father and his father told him that he had purchased a Barbie movie and some jacked up baby genius DVDs. WHAT????? No SHREK 2?!?!?!? What on earth does my child NEED to learn at this point that she can't get from Shrek 2??? Really???

First the grandparents on my side send a box full of packing peanuts cleverly disguised as packing for a few toys (but I know it was just to mess up my living room!!!) and now the other doesn't come trough with Shrek 2???? What is wrong with them??? (really and truely the wee ones have wanted Shrek 2 since they saw it in the theater, so it's NOT just me) Just for that I am going to photo copy my ticket and give it to them with a note telling them to contact the Plano Police dept for their present as that's where the pressie money went. (not really, K won't let me do that!)



* 'The Great Longneck Migration' is one of the worst childrens movies ever made. I am appaled and disgusted that James Garner is so down on his luck that he actually did a voice in this piece of crap. This movie does however explain why the dinos became extinct. Seems that all of the plant eaters were sappy, emotional, whiney, irritating and tended to break out into a song and dance routine at the drop of a hat making them easy prey for the less sappy, emotional and not at all whiney or musically inclined preditors.

Two Snaps Up And a Circle!


I just saw that among the Barbies and accessories there was some clothing options for Ken (fag). I had to stifle my laughter as I saw what the Little People chose for him to wear today. Ken truly is the Gayest Of Them All in this outfit - fer fucks sake he's got on GOLD shoes!!!!

Shoes


I've always had a serious shoe fixation. I won't mention the exact number of pairs of shoes I own as the number is rediculous. One time before I got married I counted all the pairs of shoes as I packed them in box after box and the total was 67. Yes I do have delirious dreams of squandering a small countries wealth on fine and fancy footwear. Imelda was to be envied.

But I digress (as usual), the Little People recieved Barbie and accessories last night from their favorite aunt (D) and her best friend Barrie (their favorite 'aunt'). This morning as I looked at the nightmare of cleaning of accesories on the floor I could not help but be insanely jealous over Barbie's fantastic shoes! (the gold stilettos are my favorite although I can't walk in stilettos to save my life)

Yes I know I need help. Maybe all the cookies for breakfast is affecting my brain today.

Near Jail Experience


Sometimes I tempt fate/karma/destiny and I don't even know it. Last night as we drove through Plano to go to the freaking Super Target (we had a gift card and figured we'd buy some overpriced groceries there and save our cash) I told K about how I felt a tad guilty because I had sold a package to a couple for $94 but I should have talked them into buying the $89 package instead as they would have gotten more and would have saved a few dollars. As I start this story and how my sad sales for yesterday were probably my karmic pay off for that, I pull up to a red light right next to a Plano police car. Heh, great. My cars stickers are expired. AND as some people know I'm driving around with a suspended drivers license. As luck would have it we catch the very next red light as does the police car. Damn. I hope I haven't gotten his attention but I'm fairly certain I have when he pulls behind my car and follows me for the next couple of blocks. K is turning red in the passenger seat as his blood pressure goes up. When I turn on my blinker to turn into a shopping center the officer turns on the Christmas lights and I'm officially being pulled over. As I park the car I tell K to calm down it's not a big deal and he feels the neccessity to remind me of the fact that driving on a suspended license is an arrestable offense - he didn't need to remind me of that, it had already flashed through my mind (like right when I saw the police car). I joked that it was a damn good thing I was wearing make-up and dressed nice as I'd hate to have a crappy mug shot. He didn't think I was funny.

The nice officer explained that he pulled me over because of my expired stickers and took my license - I offered him my ID as well saying "It has a better picture" which made him smile so I figured my chances of suffering police brutality on the way to jail were pretty low.

I continued to alternately joke about going to jail and reassure K that the sky was not in fact falling as the nice officer sat in his car with my identification (both license and ID) and pondered exactly how many offenses he could put on the ticket and I suppose wrestle with his conscience on whether to traumatize a couple of wee children by handcuffing mom and carting her off to jail in front of them. K didn't even laugh once, I was giving him my BEST stuff and not even a smile. *sigh*

Luckily for me they weren't filming an episode of C.O.P.S. so the nice officer just gave me a hefty ticket, asked me if I'd recieve notification of my suspended license - which I said NO, and it wasn't a lie as I have never gotten notification,(though I was prepared to lie my ass off if he had asked if KNEW about my license being suspended), he explained that it was (which I knew) and that I could go to jail for driving with a suspended license (which I also knew) and that he wasn't going to take me to jail (whew!) since it was so close to Christmas (I didn't bother to mention I'm Jewish) and I thanked him and was thankfull at that moment I didn't live in LA. :o)

After the whole ticket incident I needed a nice strong drink - thank goodness there was a Starbucks in the store. (no booze in the store, damn it!)

So now I have 10 days to take care of things. That's 10 days to figure out how exactly to whore myself out to make enough money to pay my ticket. Any suggestions???

*Note - if you feel the neccessity to tell me how I should have taken care of the stickers on my car or my suspended license, please just keep that to yourself as I already know that and really don't need to hear the obvious - I'd call my relatives if I needed to hear that one! No criticism, just sympathy (or silence) or else I'll send a band of Angry Albino Sock Monkies to your house to preform their ancient and evil Monkey Magic and curse your underwear drawer to be perpetually infested with psychotic gerbils. Now have a nice day.*

Looks Like Snow

At least it did here locally yesterday afternoon. Very locally, like just my living room.

Yesterday about 4 pm I get a knock on my door, it's my friendly (and somewhat cold) UPS delivery guy with a box about half the size of my living room. Ahhhh the presents from the grandparents. Though large it was not heavy. After shoving the box into the middle of the floor space, I cut the box open. Inside were thousands of white packing peanuts. Great. I've never really liked packing peanuts all that much, it must be from the 11 years as an administrative assistant having to pack up crap to be sent out and ending up with packing peanuts all over my desk area on a regular basis. Now that I have progeny I despise packing peanuts. Adults see packing peanuts as a minor nusance to endure which ensures the packaged materials are safe and secure. Children see packing peanuts as an instant and not uncomfortably cold snow storm, the contents of the package is completly irrelavant when packing peanuts are present. (I took their unwrapped presents out of the box with them just 4 feet from me, they NEVER noticed.)

After a quick search through the Packing Peanuts From HELL I discovered that despite the size of the box, there was very little in the way of items needing packing to such extent. Much to the Little People's delight the box was mostly full of packing peanuts and within minutes of removing the packages from the box, my living room had 6 in deep snow drifts.

I know you must be thinking I'm just a horrible bitch for not letting the Little People have their snow storm, but you obviously have never had to clean up a styrofoam packing peanut snow storm. Sweeping makes them scatter, vacuuming is difficult as the small amount of air generated from the brushes in the vacuum cause them to scatter and for some reason some of them tend to be kind of staticy and stick to the broom, vacuum, furniture, pets or clothes. When packing peanuts are used for a snow storm many tend to get torn into tiny little staticy pieces that resist normal cleaning methods. Yesterday I picked up most of the peanuts by hand, then vacuumed very well to get up the tiny pieces and this morning I'm still looking at pieces of them on the floor. Insidious little bastards just hang on to furniture hiding until the floor is completly clean, I'll be finding these particle for the next three weeks.

In summary, packing peanuts are Satan's creation, the UPS store who packaged the presents in such a fucking huge box to use so many of these damn peanuts are obviously the Minions of Satan and the grandparents who sent the box of toys are Evil (but hey, they are my family I think I've covered the Evilness of them before). And the only people who are truly happy are the Little People, because despite me yelling at them and banishing them to their room while I shoveled out the living room, they still have presents and they did after all get their show storm.

You Drew A WHAT?!?!?!


Super Girl brought home this picture she drew just for ME. Take a look at it and tell me what YOU see.

Our conversation went as follows:

Her: I drew this just for you.
Me: Oh thanks.
Me: *with raised eyebrows* What's this? (Pointing to figure on the right)
Her: That's a candy cane.
Me: Ahhh. What's this? (pointing to the more questionable figure on the left)
Her: Oh I just messed up. *wanders off to play tea party with Cabbage Patch*
Me: *thinking how thankful I am it's just a candy cane and not an awfully good depiction of something battery powered in mommy's nightstand drawer*

It's a CANDY CANE you pervert! (yeah I know, so am I)

Welcome Hanta!


I have a new rodent and I'm quite enamored with her. I've named her Hanta Virus, Hanta for short. (yes I know I'm touched in the head for naming my gerbils after rodent borne illnesses - Bea, short for Bubonic Plague). We picked her up earlier this week. I have wanted to get a friend for Bea as I had read on several sites about how gerbils are social creatures and need a buddy or they'll become depressed. I am the last person to want a pet rodent on Prozac so I began looking for a companion female gerbil (no breeding pets for me, I'd rather have a couple of lesbo rodents than have a litter of gerbils to deal with). A continual check of the nearby Pet Smart yielded us no luck as they only carry male gerbils (and other rodents) (we learned of their anti-female rodent policy earlier this week when we finally ASKED if they had any females) - I had contacted a few breeders about wanting a baby but none of the butt-licks.. I mean breeders felt I was deserving of a gerbil or an answer for that matter. We headed south a couple of towns and found the coolest mecca of pets - just as it was about to close! K pleaded with the proprietor that we were just needing a female gerbil and they apparently were the ONLY place in the area that carried them. Everyone scurried out of the car and into the store. I was imediatly in awe of all the exotic little beasties for sale and promised the Little People that we would definitly return to this store if only to let them (and ME) see all of the furry critters I won't ever let them have. We were quickly ushered back to the Wonderful Wall of Rodents (that's what I call it anyway) where we all ooohhed and ahhhed at the amazing selection of rodents - the chinchilla was sooooo cool! Before I became mesmerized by the adorable bunnies, I told the helpful, ever patient proprietor that I wanted the smallest (because it would probably be the youngest) female in the cage that wasn't Cinnamon colored (because I want to be able to tell my rodents apart, duh). The specimen pictured above is what I got.

We paid our $10.81 and left with a little cardboard box wrapped rodent. My rodent.

Once home I proceded to prove to my family what an incredible idiot I truly am. I dumped Hanta into Bea's cage. Suddenly what was intended as a cute and cuddly gerbil moment turned into a caged death match between Hanta and Bea, with Bea being the giant agressor. Despite the gerbils being rather tiny I was still reluctant to stick my unprotected hand in the cage to break up the battle - hey I've seen Bea reduce a wooden spoon into splinters in just a few hours, she can turn a toilet paper roll into shreds in 60 seconds, I wasn't about to have her mistake my fingers for Hanta and have me bitten, because then I'd hate her and seriously consider poisoning her or tossing her to my cat for a treat or something unmentionably horrible that I would consider but never actuallly do. Seeing the danger my new baby was in I skillfully used the box to separate the gerbils (well actually I think I made some uninteligible sounds of panic as I shoved the box in the cage to stop Bea's murderous rampage, luckily Hanta is smart and realized her best chance for survival was to hop off the side of the cage that she had just jumped on and to get IN the box) and removed Hanta from harms way (harms way = Bea's homicidal rage). Hanta is now in her own tiny cage - safe.

Apparently I missed the section in the gerbil FAQ's that said that some gerbils are not so much social as Sociopaths and that the longer they are kept as lone gerbils the more likely they will develop homicidal and sociopathic tendencies. Bea has taken to watching Hanta. she even took all the bedding out of her little penthouse - she used to spend much of her time stuffing her penthouse with bedding or just burrowing in her bedding up there. Now she's made a little nest in the bottom of her cage where she can watch Hanta in her cage. She occasionally goes to the bars to sniff at her and sometimes bites at the bars, I suppose in frustration or anxiety or psychotic rage.

I had read about how it can be difficult to introduce a companion to an older gerbil (Bea is a few months old and considered older), but for some idiotic reason I chose to completly ignore that and just assume that some kind of Disney union would take place and we'd all be knocked into a diabetic coma with sheer cuteness of their new friendship. Not so. Now I surf the internet for tips on introduction and antipsychotic medication in gerbil doses. I don't want to have a dead gerbil, I also don't want two cages to clean. I'm giving then just a few weeks to get used to each other and then I'm going to get rid of one (most likely Bea will go live with B (I'll have to check if it's even legal to give a gay man a gerbil) and I'll get a companion for Hanta) if they can not live together. I want two gerbils, cute and cuddly and if I wait to long and they never accept each other (well really if Bea continues to be a sociopath) then I'll have the same issues with Hanta. So that's where it stands, Hanta Virus and Bubonic Plague are incompatible, but there is much hope that they can co-exist.

Jesus Is The Reason? Really?

This article just galls me. (read it) I thought about it all day long before writing this (wanted to make sure I was properly offensive to everyone). This group is talking about putting ‘Christ’ back in Christmas by forcing stores to put MERRY CHRISTMAS on their advertisements or they won’t shop there. Yeah, that’s a really GOOD way to show the CHRISTMAS spirit. (eyes rolling up in head) I mean really, isn’t Christmas all about the colorful lights and the big ol’ tree all covered in ornaments and a mountain of presents to tear into on Christmas morning? Since I’m a Jew I might be confused, but I’m going back on my 7 years as a Christian convert for this knowledge. I may not have read that book really well, but I don’t think I saw anything in there about how Mary and Joseph set up a grand Christmas tree next to the baby’s manger, nor do I recall hearing how the three wise men brought fabulous presents from Baby Gap, Old Navy and Gymboree for Jesus. I'm pretty confident there was no Baby's First Christmas ornament up on the tree. I’m kind of foggy on whether there were lovely blinking lights strung over the stable, I do recall something about a bright and sparkly star, so maybe there was. I can’t remember or not if there was a passage about how the shepherds got caught in traffic trying to get to Jesus birthday party because of all the traffic at the malls, the lack of Amazon wish list for Jesus probably made shopping for him a real bitch. I’m almost certain there wasn’t anything about Mary wearing her brand new Christmas clothes as she set the table for all the guests. There was no ‘JESUS IS THE REASON FOR THE SEASON’ in bright lights on the fence behind the stable. No piped in carols to entertain, no tensile on anything. I’m not really sure when Santa Clause arrived to bring baby J a shiny silver engraved rattle from Tiffany’s and a load of Discovery Toys (age appropriate of course), but it must be in there somewhere. The shepherds probably didn’t mind tending to the eight tiny reindeer along with their flocks and the light from Rudolph's nose made things extra festive as people took turns standing under the mistletoe for a kiss. I bet all of Santas elves were quite helpful what with Mary having just had a baby and all the guests hanging around. And I KNOW I did not read anything about anyone heading to WalMart, Target or the mall for the after Christmas sales. Please feel free to correct me if I am wrong on any of this.

The whole article is utterly ridiculous. Trying to de-secularize Christmas by demanding all the secular symbols of Christmas be instated is insane. Really I have to ask, is Jesus REALLY the reason for all of this? For all the self indulgent presents, for all the holiday stress, for all the frantic buying, for all the ornaments and flashing lights? Honestly, what would Jesus do for Christmas? Where would Jesus shop? And would he max out his credit cards? What would Jesus say – Happy Holidays, Merry Christmas or Happy Hanukah (that’s got my vote)? The world will never know.

* Take a moment to think about it, beneath all the sarcasm there is a point being made.