Table for Awkward, Party of Me

So remember when you were a kid and you thought your teacher lived in the school and then you saw her at the Safeway and you were all WHAT THE HELL? Mrs. Lyle DOESN'T live in a cave behind the coat closet? NO. WAY. Then she said "hi" to you and even though not two hours before you were waving your arm around shouting ME! ME! ME! trying to get her to pay attention to you, now, because you're not at school, somehow her saying hi to you makes you blush and sort of hide behind your mom?

Yeah. Well the adult equivalent of that? It's seeing your male gynecologist at the Victoria's Secret holding a pair of red lace thong panties.

Not Duck Short

My new swim suit arrived yesterday. It's exactly the same swim suit that I had last year.

OH, WAIT. NOT.

See, here's the thing. When you buy a plus sized suit (last years was a 16) the skirted bottom is 17" long. To compensate for your having things like, you know, AN ASS. Or, maybe, you know, BEING TALLER THAN A DUCK. The regular sized suit (a ten...so still not the sort of size one expects Heidi Klum and her stick legged like to be cavorting around in) is only 13 inches long. Now, you're probably thinking (like I was; because we're dumbasses) that after using a ruler and sort of hopping up and down so you can see in the bathroom mirror where the allegedly 13 inch skirt is going to end and then deciding that after you smacked your shin for the third time that it was probably long enough that you wouldn't have to wax your bikini line TOO exuberantly and anyway, it's only $30 which is a reasonable, because HELLO, It's VEGAS TIME in like two week and you're not going to actually lose that last twenty pounds and the prospect of standing in the unforgiving light and the 4H infested floors of the JC Penny dressing room is enough to make you hang yourself with your amazing new chain & ribbon necklace (shout out to Clairs 10 for $10 clearance and a big FUCK OFF to everyone who just said "you're not 14, why are you shopping there!?") and then you're all FINE, FUCK IT! and just order the damned thing. In black. Because black is slimming, right? You'll totally look just like Heidi Klum in a black swim suit, right? And anyway the blue one you really like isn't on sale and you're not a complete masochist so you can't justify spending $74 EACH PIECE for a new swim suit that you'll wear...twice? Maybe? And anyway, the black goes with your sexy (AHEM, certain people; SEXY, and FASHIONABLE, NOT SILLY) sun glasses.

Then, you wait excitedly. By "excitedly", I probably mean "drunkenly". By "probably" I mean "totally".

True to their word (hello, free standard shipping!) the package arrives in the allotted 4 to 7 days and even though you had a big fight with your husband the night before that wound up with both of you packing and then having a stand off about who had to actually move out and even though you've got a migraine and even though the dog puked in FOUR MOTHER FUCKING PLACES, you take that sucker into the bathroom and put it on.

AND THEN YOU STAB YOUR EYES OUT WITH THE TWEEZERS.

Because 13"? SHOWS A SHIT LOAD OF WHITE, WHITE THIGH.

Bastards.

How can they DO this to me? ME? Me of the pasty, white, white winter thighs with their soft whiteness and the glowing pale? After I told the WHOLE TEN PEOPLE who read this piece of Internet clogging awesomeness that I loved their damn swim suits and I'd wear it in public and now it would seem I meant 'wear it and show my pubic' which isn't NEARLY a good idea. Unless it's true that people will pay you to put your clothes back on and that's why the fat stripper earns the most (is that true? I could use a second job.)

SO THEN. Then, I have to return the damn thing (just the bottoms. The top is perfect) and hope that the replacement (a luxurious 15") will be long enough.

Otherwise, I suggest y'all don't look in the direction of Vegas unless you're wearing welding glasses or want the white, white glow of my ass burned into your retinas forever.

Natural Blonde

Me: I really doubt that truck stop has the worlds best pancakes.

M: I don't like pancakes.

Me: Me either. I like waffles WAY BETTER.

M: But not just waffles, TROJAN WAFFLES.

Me: Um.. I think you might mean BELGIUM WAFFLES.

M: what's the difference?

Me: The Trojan ones are ribbed for her pleasure.

M: They....EW. GOD MOM, you're SO GROSS.

Out my mouth with the blah, blah, blah

My head is all full of rants today. Which is usual, I suppose, because it's Monday. Whose head ISN'T full of rants on Monday morning, am I right?

Of course I am. I'm always right. It's part of my charm.

All things considered I had a pretty good weekend. I had red velvet cake cheesecake on Saturday with a couple of my favorite people and one people I actively have to remind myself not to kick. But the other two I enjoyed very much. And there was cheesecake. And fried cheese. so really, pretty hard not to call THAT a win.

There *was* a little drama on Saturday night. It was prom night and M had bought a dress that she was super excited about. The only problem was it was so short you could see her scary knickers. I had to veto it, of course. Which lead to tears. Of course. Which lead to trying on everything in both of our closets. Which lead to more tears. Which lead to calling Baby Mama to try on everything in HER closet. Which lead to MORE tears and a trip to Ross. Can I get a Hallelujah for Ross? $17 and she had a short zebra print lurex dress with a hot pink sash. Looked cute, fit great and solved the drama. Well, that and the punk heels I let her buy. Zippers and studs. And about 7" tall. Pick your battles, Moms, that's my theory.

Sunday SIL decided that she wanted to do "something crazy". I suggested she pierce her nipples, find a casual encounter on Craigs List and then do some blow, but NOOOO some people are just no fun. So I took her to the place I get my hair done and while she was there I went looking for swim suits.

WHAT THE FUCKING HELL are designers thinking when it comes to swim suits, anyway? I can't be the only girl in the world who doesn't want my thigh fat hanging out for the world to see. And yet EVERY SINGLE FUCKING SUIT ends right mid-thigh fat. You know that part about 3" down from your hoo-ha? Right there. In the widest, palest, flabbiest part of your thigh as if to say, "Hey, y'all! Wanna see the cake I ate in 1990? LOOK RIGHT HERE!" That's fucked up, that's what that is. And really, $120? ARE YOU FUCKING HIGH? Needless to say, I had to console myself myself with pretzel bites and cheese. I mean if the world is going to look at my pale fleshy thighs, there might as well be something to see, ya know what I mean?

I did find a pair of shorts though.

Sorry in advance for the sun spot that's going to reflect off my legs and cause y'all to go blind. I can't help it. I'm Irish. That's just what color we are. Be glad you can't see my ass. Be glad of that on a number of levels actually.

I did finally find a swim suit today though. Lands End. Can I get a wooooohoooo? Thought so. I got the Swim Mini and a top with scrunchable sides that hides mah belly./ I can't make it post the pictures, and I can't get it to post the link, so whatever. It's cute. And you can't see my upper thigh fat.

Which means? I can go eat some more cheesecake! Did you hear the angels sing just now? Thought so.

Friends Off

I have had house guests for the last two weeks. While I love these people, OH MY GOD WHY DON'T THEY ALL JUST FUCKING LEAVE? You know what I mean? It's all fine and good to see people that live far, far away and SURE I do love the excuse to do all the stupid touristy shit that is too cheesy to do as a resident but I'M NOT FUCKING KIDDING WITH THE ALWAYS AT MY HOUSE BULLSHIT.

How's a girl supposed to walk around naked?!

Just kidding. I don't do that. It scares the dogs. And the neighbors have that restraining order. But I digress.

But if I WANTED TO, I couldn't. That makes me stabby. Stabbier. Let's be honest, I'm stabby by nature. Much like I would be naughty by nature if I had a less active guilty conscience. Oh, who am I trying to lie to? Me? Not so much with the guilty.

Except for that time I stole a lipstick from Bartells and then snuck in and put it back even though I'd already used it. It's the thought that counts.

So ANYWAY. Last night, I was hiding in the bathroom pretending to poo, but actually watching old SNL skits on YouTube on my iTouch when I had the MOST BRILLIANT IDEA EVER.

But then? Someone started banging on the door asking if I had died in there and I was tempted to pretend that I had, but I don't want to be that girl that died on the crapper Elvis Style, so instead I moaned a little as though I was giving birth to an epic food baby and said that I would be right out.

And do you think that I can remember what my brilliant idea was? NO.

So now? Not only have these house guests eaten all the Oreos they've robbed me of my Best Idea Ever.

Jerks.

Conspiracy Theory

Things that are proof that the Universe is Evil and conspires against us:

1) Those really cute shoes that are the last pair and really cheap will always be a half size too small. So you'll buy them anyway, because they'll TOTALLY break in, right? Only they won't and you'll have to hobble around with bleeding feet all day because OF COURSE it's the one day your normally sedentary life turns into a MUST RUN EVERYWHERE busy sort of day.

2) You only have a good hair day when there is no one to show it to. You will have a HORRIBLE hair day when there are to be photos taken. That girl you hate? Her hair is always perfect.

3) The next person to sit at the slot machine you just put $20 into will drop in a dime and win $500 on her first spin while you're still close enough to see her jump for joy.

4) If you used to wear a size xxl and now wear a size medium, everything on the clearance rack that you love will be a size XXL

5) The roadtrip you elect to opt out of will be the one that your friends will never shut up about for the rest of your lives.

6) The lipstick color that you LOVE and that looks perfect on you will obviously have to immediately be discontinued. Same with the jeans that make your legs look long and thin and the underware that doesn't ride up and the perfect shade of red nail polish.

7) If you pass a sign that says "no services for the next 60 miles" and you think "I don't really need to pee" you WILL REALLY NEED TO PEE and you'll have to find a bush on the side of the road, dig around under the seats for an only slightly filthy McDonalds napkin to use as toilet paper and pray that no one sees you squat and also that you don't pee on your shoes and that a snake or a rabid badger or a really big hairy spider doesn't creep up and bite you on the ass and so when that piece of grass tickles your ass you'll wind up jumping up mid stream and then there will pee all over your pants and you'll have to ride in pee-pants.

8) The time you don't close all the windows on your computer and leave Farmville open on your desk top when you get up to get a coffee will be the time your boss decides to come by and wait for you to return.

9) The $59 airfare isn't going anywhere you want to go at any time you could go there. Or, worse, becomes available on YOUR flight only after you've booked a non-refundable $250 seat.

10) If it tastes good, it's bad for you.

Here

Here is you and here am I. We are alone, for once. The afternoon is fading behind the drawn shades and I lay in the crook of your arm listening to your heart beat.

Here I am and there you are, sweat drying on our skin when the red glow of sunset turns to street light shine. The scent of you and I together hangs like perfume in the air and I am drunk with it.

There are my clothes and there are yours. Pulled on, they cover the marks that testify our need to consume one another whole. I would eat your heart and serve you my soul to have one more moment connected.

Here you are, at last. Here is my heart, yours. Here is my soul, yours. Here am I, yours; always yours.

Self Portrait

Carry On

Right. So. The Crazy.

Yes, yes. I know this is an Old Topic and I've discussed it to Death. The thing about the Crazy is, it's all consuming. Think you're okay? HAHAHAH. God laughs at your Okay. Check book balanced with enough left over for some shoes you don't need? Kiss your transmission goodbye. Not enough to send you over the edge? Let's add in a roofing estimate $7000 more than you'd planned. Still okay? Well, let's talk about an old dog that's decided to gnaw off the cancerous tumor that's inoperable! What? YOU'RE STILL NOT ROCKING IN A CORNER? FINE. How about if I poke this little whatsit so the washing machine starts to make a funny noise? DAMN IT WOMAN, WHY AREN'T YOU IN THE BOOBY HATCH YET? Fine. FINE. I'll just make this stove burner not turn off, and I'll....I'll....oh! rust out the shower door track! and I'll....raise your cable and cell and insurance bills and then I'll....remind you that you still have to pay for summer camp! Including plane tickets! OH! Hahaha! One more thing! I'll slip in this amusing little tip bit; your in-laws haven't EVER paid rent or a mortgage in their entire lives! And someone just bought them a new house and updated the entire interior! What's that? You don't think that's funny? Well the knob to the kitchen sink just came off in your hands and you still have to roll down the window to use the latch on the OUTSIDE to open your car door. THAT IS FUNNY, RIGHT? Don't you think it's annoying when someone else gets a new car handed to them? Maybe you want to see pictures anyway? OH COME ON. YOU KNOW THAT'S FUNNY.

No?

Hey!?

Why are you hiding under the desk eating a grilled cheese and Xanax sandwich? I haven't shown you what I've done to the fence in the back yard!

Oh! And did I mention that you're going to have house guests for the next month who're going to be less than impressed that your fourteen year old dog sometimes forgets the difference between carpet and grass?

I really can't understand why you're drinking wine straight out of the bottle, because I haven't even told you the BEST. PART. YET! you're going to get to spend every hour you're not at work with your husband! DOESN'T THAT SOUND AWESOME?

No?

FINE. You can have nightmares when you DO manage to sleep, but that is IT. You're not getting anything else.

Except a really huge papercut.

I hope you're satisfied, missy.

So. Yeah. The Crazy and me? We're still here, just....sometimes we're not fit for company, you know?

Say You Wheel

Eat It

The problem with most advice about losing weight is it's nothing you want to do. Diet and exercise? FUCK NO. That sounds horrible. I don't want to do that. How about some REAL tricks for avoiding eating things you shouldn't? What do REAL people do? Because let's be honest here, those people who preach in the magazine about their amazing diet that helped them lose those five horrible pounds that kept them in a size six instead of a four? Those bitches? CAN FUCK OFF. Fuck off forever, in fact.

In spite of the fact that I had gastric bypass, I still struggle with the *need* to snack. Do I REALLY need to snack? No. Do I want to? HELL YES, I do. So, here are MY tricks to keep from eating an entire tube of Pillsbury Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough.

1) Brush your teeth. Everything tastes nasty when eaten when you're minty fresh. If you're not somewhere you can brush, chew minty gum.

2) Paint your nails. Do you really want Dorrito textured polish? Didn't think so.

3) Eat it anyway. When I want a peanut butter cup I eat one. It's not going to kill me. By allowing myself to have it, it loses the forbidden fruit aspect.

4) Figure out your triggers and avoid them. In my case, it's "piece" style candy, like M&M's or Jelly Beans. Do I KNOW that the 1/2lb bag isn't the serving size? Yes. Do I feel the need to eat them anyway? HELL YES. So, I avoid them or buy smaller packages. If chips are your trigger, buy the lunch bag sized instead of the family size. The empty bag may trigger the "done" switch.

5) 1/2 hour promise. Tell yourself that if, in a half hour, you still REALLY REALLY want whatever it is, you can have it. Then distract yourself by doing something that requires your whole attention, like cleaning out your closet or arguing with your spouse. My short attention span means I usually forget whatever it was I was going to eat.

6) Protein first. This one came from my nutritionist, but it works for me. I start every day with protein and I eat the protein part of my meal first, then the veg and then, if I still have room left, I hit the carbs.

7) Pack a snack. If I'm out and I'm hungry, you can bet your ass I'm going to find a snack and chances are it's not going to be good for me. (Can I get a WOOT WOOT for Cinnabon?)Unless I bring it with me. I usually have a (100 calorie/mini) Ziploc of peanuts in my purse. The beauty of peanuts (mmmm honey roasted peanuts) is that they don't smoosh or melt.

8) Hand over your clean plate club membership card. Remember that? How your mom wouldn't let you leave the table until you'd finished your meal? Screw that. I usually pause about half way through my meal and wait a few minutes. More often than not, I find that I don't finish what's left because my brain catches up with my stomach and I feel full. Especially in restaurants where the portions are HUGE. Not even just for us tennis ball sized stomach people, huge in general. At some restaurants (and especially with pasta) I box up half of it right away. Out of site out of mind style. Plus? Lunch for the next day!

9) Food eaten on birthdays and holidays don't have calories. Fine, they do. Life is too short to never eat dessert. The month of December isn't a holiday (so no eating an entire plate of cookies every day for a month), but Christmas is, so on the 25th eat whatever the hell you want and enjoy it. Same with your birthday.

10) Fatten up your friends. This is my favorite tip, by the way. I like to bake. I also know I don't need to eat 24 cupcakes. So I bake them, I eat one, I give the rest away. This works out awesome for two reasons. First, EVERYONE loves the girl who brings them cupcakes! Second, if your friends are Little Jazzy Scooter Fat, you look thinner in comparison!

Now, who wants a cookie?

Oh, Snap!

I suspect people think I'm kidding when I tell you that I see things like a fat lady at a bus stop wearing nothing but a bed sheet, or the time I saw a guy walking a rooster on a leash, or that time the mariachi band rear ended the nuns. But I'm not!


This time, I have photographic proof! Proof that I almost DIED getting for you guys! Because that's how dedicated I am to this blog. You're welcome.

It's a Red Neck Strip Club. Seriously.

Innocents

It's summertime and we have completed our chores. The sky is the sort of blue that breaks your heart and the neighborhood smells of fresh cut grass as lazy bumble bees buzz the tea roses that climb the trellis.

We are in the backyard, licking melted red rivers of Kool-aide Popsicles from the sides of our hands in the shade of the pear tree. Gram would say we've joined the Blackfoot tribe, with braided pig tails and freckled shoulders, the soles of our feet filthy from games of Freeze Tag and Statuary and Mother May I played barefoot across all the lawns on our side of the street.

There is Heather, sprawled out across the bench and there is Gennie perched on the railing, Stefanie beneath her feet in danger of getting kicked. And here are we; three peas of sisters, side by side on the steps. In the fall the Big Girls will go to Junior High and trade in Sardines and Red Rover for Maybelline and Loves me not. But today, we are children. Today we are innocents.

Okay

This is the morning that it could all come apart and I know it. I have a rope and it has an end and I am there. The buzz of the refrigerator competes with the hum of the light and the tick, tick, tick of the infernally loud clock to drive me mad and I tap, tap, tap the purple pen with the chewed up edge on the strip of wood at the edge of my desk to drown it out. To drown out the screaming.

In the background the phone rings over the blaring beat of a song that I hate as my email chirps and there is someone talking, but all I can hear is the tick, tick, tick of that damn clock. I know that if it ticks again I will smash it into a million little pieces and then pick them up and eat them so the jagged edge of broken time scratches it's way down my throat to settle in a brittle ball of desolation in the pit of my belly.

I have thrown the clock away in the big green dumpster so the tell tale heart will not cause my end. Instead I have decided that too many pills and a glass of whiskey will taste far better. I begin to clear things into the trash with grim glee.

Click, click, click, Delete and then there you were. Not looking at the camera with your hand resting on my sleeping shoulder, caught quietly off guard in the light of a rain swept day. I put my head down on my desk and wept.

When there was nothing left to fill the cracked jar that holds my resolve, I went to you. You held me in the palm of your hand, eyes closed until wisps of okay swirled through me and I could breathe.

Report

Officer Mustache is tapping his pen on the edge of his notebook, already bored and thinking about breakfast, or doe season, or his truck payment. The red and blue lights flash disco ball glitter on my tears stained face. Officer Tightpants is writing down what I say, disinterested as her partner, but deceitfully engaged.

Dispatch crackles in the background confirming that I am in fact who I say, and for a moment I am taken with the urge to laugh. As though I would lie. As though I would claim this mess I call my life if I didn't have to. But instead I choke it back as a hiccoughed sob and Officer Mustache looks for a minute as though he is present.

Well, Tightpants says We have everything we need. She hands me the carboned report and the card for Domestic Disturbance at the Gallatin County Court House before they climb into the cruiser and leave me alone to watch the bushes for the eye shine that means you were serious when you said you would never leave me alone