Note To Self No. 473

Dear Self,

I know you are a very caring mom and when your son comes to you and speaks the words “boo boo”, you never hesitate to immediately give the afflicted area a kiss to make it all better. However, in the future? You should make darned sure he is saying “boo boo” when he presents an index finger to you before automatically giving it one of your All-Better!™ mommy kisses because he might really be saying “poo poo” and actually trying to show you what he found sneaking out of his extremely poop-filled diaper.

Additionally, I strongly recommend that you never cut a very long and audible fart while opening the front door to let the cat out. A male neighbor might be approaching on the other side. And I know you NEED to believe it’s possible but I don’t think that anyone would mistake that fart for a creaky door. I’m just sayin.

Warm regards,
Izzy

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Guilty Pleasures? Pshaw!

Rolling Stone recently released their list of the top 25 Undisputed Guilty Pleasure Bands and uh…I’m a little miffed that the bulk of this list comprises the music of my youth. Am OLD.

1. Rush
2. E.L.O.
3. Journey
4. ABBA
5. Chicago
6. Boston
7. Foreigner
8. Bread
9. Bon Jovi
10. New Edition
11. The Monkees
12. Motley Crue
13. STYX
14. Eddie Money
15. Simply Red
16. Kelly Clarkson
17. America
18. Wham
19. R.E.O. Speedwagon
20. Poison
21. Lionel Richie
22. Kansas
23. Air Supply
24. Hall & Oates
25. Britney Spears

That’s not to say I liked them all but seriously, people… Can you honestly say Journey was a *guilty* pleasure? Come on. You know good and well that you were lip-syncing to Don’t Stop Believin in the mirror and couple skating to the power ballad-y goodness of Open Arms with the same reckless abandon as every other 12-24 year old in America in 1980. There’s no guilt there. It was love. Stone in Love.

And Foreigner? Made me wanna know what love is. Made me Hot Blooded. And when my 9th grade boyfriend broke up with me because I wouldn’t have sex with him? Foreigner made me Cold as Ice. Yeah. And you know you loved some Foreigner, too.

And though he probably SHOULD be considered a guilty pleasure, who didn’t know all the words to EVERY Lionel Richie song whether you liked it or not?

I could go on all day but, by your luck, I have to make dinner so I’ll just leave you with MY top 3 choices for guilty pleasures off this list and you can leave me yours, from on or off the list, if you dare.

1. Wham - Because men running around in short shorts and dayglo colored gloves could be nothing BUT a guilty pleasure and to prove my point, I always liked Careless Whisper. Secretly. Guiltily. It’s in my iTunes library RIGHT NOW.

2. Hall & Oates - I said it before and I’ll say it again, if loving Hall & Oates, secretly or otherwise, is wrong, then I don’t wanna be right. Ah-I can’t go for that. No-oh-oh. No can do.

3. The Monkees - Because? They weren’t even a real band. And yes, I dug ‘em. A lot. But dude…I was, like, four.

Creepiest. Babies. Ever.

Prepare yourself for the weirdest, freakiest babies you’ve ever seen. Note their expressionless faces, their soulless eyes. Note their uncanny ability to sing like old pros while still unable to speak intelligibly. This is the devil’s handiwork, I tell you. We’re still asking why? Why did our eyes have to see this?

Okay, okay, I confess. The freakishly talented Stepford Babies are the result of some seriously low-tech trickery. They came to us on a benign looking videotape called Singing Babies, given to my son by a friend. We like to put it on for company and pretend there’s nothing unusual about it.

A Disturbing Trend

When did soccer moms start wearing short shorts and high heels? To the grocery store? Seriously, ladies… Dressing like Victoria Beckham when you’re not Victoria Beckham just makes you look like one of those secret suburban hooker moms that Oprah’s always talking about. Please stop.

So my 18 yr old cat was sick and I took her to the vet yesterday. I told the vet I thought she had a urinary tract infection. $310 later? The vet tells me she has a urinary tract infection.

Oh, and the vet did that hairdresser maneuver where they very subtly shame you into buying the really expensive shampoo cat food from them because if you don’t you’re clearly a bad hair pet owner who doesn’t care about your appearance cat because if you did, you’d just fork over the twenty bucks for a bottle of shampoo 3.5 lb bag of cat food.

I bought it. Am spineless.

It was 28 degrees here yesterday morning. It snowed on the east coast of Florida. The day before that?

I was wearing shorts. Without my heels.

Home for the Holidays

Well, it’s Christmas eve and I’m completely done with everything I needed to do. All the presents are wrapped, cookies baked, scooters and trikes assembled and not a damn thing planned for tomorrow.

We usually travel the weekend before Christmas to see my sister-in-law’s family and all my husband’s siblings come and it’s a big, hectic gathering where I generally spend the whole 2-3 days chasing my toddler around and making sure he doesn’t fall in the unsecured pool or break something or many things. Oh, and listening to my daughter complain that her cousin (2 yrs older) won’t play with her, which always pisses me off because it’s so rude and bratty of him. Not exactly my definition of fun but we still do it just about every year.

This year, however, we didn’t do it because our only car (since the vacation fiasco of early December that resulted in the untimely death of my momvan) is a Camry and it’s just not conducive to family trips. We don’t travel light and at Christmas time we have presents and stuff to bring with us. Ugh… So we bailed this year.

And we usually spend Christmas day at my in-laws house which is always preceded by a fashion tantrum from me because I don’t want to wear the same thing I wore last year or at Thanksgiving the month before but I can’t dress down because they all dress so nice and I don’t want to be the shlub.

So I hem and haw and curse my lack of non-casual clothing and I curse the fact that I’m 15 lbs heavier than I was before I had kids and had to give away all my nice clothes and then I throw together something Christmas-y that I hate and we show up late.

Then I spend the whole time making sure my son doesn’t wreck the place or injure himself and I spend the entire meal trying to coax him to eat something instead of doing what he normally does when left to his own devices which is really messy and pretty unsavory for those who aren’t accustomed to his antics.

Good times, indeed. But alas, we will not be having those good times this year as my mother-in-law has decided to go out of state for Christmas.

Which means? We get to open presents and then lounge around the house all day. No fashion crises, no toddler-wrangling, no small talk, no formal dinner. In fact, I think we’re just going to order out tomorrow evening and not even attempt cooking a meal, which is good seeing as I don’t actually HAVE the stuff required for a holiday dinner.

Either way, it’s going to be our first no-commitment Christmas in thirteen years. Can you feel me exhaling a huge sigh of relief (and joy)?

So I went to the mall today because I’m a masochist and I had a yen for some real pain and suffering. I just had a couple last minute things I needed to get which I think is pretty impressive considering I haven’t had a car at my disposal for two weeks now.

Did you know that if you try to buy one of those moisture-wicking, stretchy running shirts for a man, on Christmas eve, that the only sizes left in every single store will be XXL and XXXL? That’s great if your guy wears one of those sizes. If he wears a medium? You’re shit out of luck.

Also, I had a mall-bangs sighting. At the mall. Ha ha! but seriously, who does that anymore? WHO?

Okay, time to try and go to sleep. I’m notorious for being tired and cranky on Christmas morning.

I wish you all a very merry Christmas. May your day have no family arguments, hurt feelings, obnoxious in-laws or weird gifts – like the chocolate fountain we got last year.

I was all for it until my BFF told me you had to add oil to the chocolate to make it flow, which totally grossed me out. But I know, ultimately, that I’m much better off not having oily chocolate in my life.

I’ve tried to think of someone who might like it so I could regift it to them but I seriously don’t know a single person who would welcome an oily chocolate fountain into their home. It might be time to rejoin that freakshow known as Freecycle.

Enjoy your Christmas :)