The answer is "not since bills started arriving with my name on them". Who gets excited by mail, past age 13? I'll tell you who- this girl, that's who.
I present to you what I got from one of my fabulous readers (my mom!):
That's right. An entire case of Spreeeeeees!
Of course, Mom is earning herself a reputation. Substitute "waffle maker" for "Sprees", and you get this post from my sister, Lindsey. We really lucked out with that mom of ours.
This post is dedicated to The Bloggess- who is insane, but only in a way that makes me worry for her, not for me or my children. If you've never read her stuff, you must, if for no other reason than that this post will make no sense to you. She makes up words, fights with her husband, and very occasionally offends a major religion in her blog, and I swear I am talking about someone other than me.
Anyway, her bit that actually applies to this post is here, and it's from a while ago, but, damn y'all, I can't plan life. It just happens this way.
My kick-ass niece Bailey, who just turned 12- happy birthday, Bailey!- inherited from her mother the ability to rock a crane machine. I think she's kinda addicted to them (she got a mini one for her birthday, and that's the one thing she shared with me when I called her), but that's okay- we're talking quarters here, not dime bags of illicit drugs.
When we were last visiting her house, she told us how she had scored a Wolverine toy (boys hate it when you call their play-things "dolls", even if it is a friggin' doll), but not just one Wolverine. Girl had managed to get three of those suckers all at once! I told you, she can rock a crane machine. This is how Ethan ended up with two of his very own- those and a Batman. Kick-ass and generous, she is.
So we're cruising the parking lot of the soccer fields (yes, I'm there all the effing time- I am aware of this, shut up) and the kids are playing/bickering in the backseat and repeatedly I hear references to "wolverines" (Ethan's choice for entertainment during Connor's game that night) and The Bloggess just suddenly pops into my head and I let out a cry of "Wolverines!!" and all three of my kids, with no pause, simultaneously respond "Wolverines!!" and that is why I not only have a kick-ass niece, but three kick-ass kids, as well.
This is my blog. Welcome! It's not terribly popular, which is fine because then I'd feel some obligation to write something of quality and also on a regular basis. And, honestly, maybe I do have time for that, but I'm far too lazy. It would definitely cut into my lazy time.
That does not mean I don't pay attention to what's going on with it, though. I see how many times it was visited in a day, I see what people are reading, I see where they're reading it from (both physically and how they found me). Mo Diva- obsessed with food, this girl, but totally dedicated to thoroughness on said subject- sends a lot of traffic (the good kind) my way. Also, I pay attention to who is following me- I do check your sites, just in case you don't use the stalker software I do. (By the way, Andy? For clarity, your "hoo haw" and my "hoo haw"? We're totally referring to different things (assuming I ever mention my hoo haw). Let's not get these things confused, okay?)
I'm related to close to half of my over a dozen followers, so it doesn't take a whole lot of "paying attention", but I noticed a while ago a new picture appeared, but the number hadn't changed. Eh. People change their image. No big deal.
I looked closer today. Y'all? My mother unfollowed me. This? Will be a rift bigger than that between Candi and Tori Spelling! How dare you unfollow me! (Shut up, Cassie, it's not a "technical issue".) I'm not sure what I did*, lady, but you are never seeing my children again! Also? I'm taking all my sisters with me! (They're totally going to take my side on this completely rational issue.) You will be stuck with just Dad to talk to! How do you like that, huh?
Ahem. Sorry about that... to Dad! You can come, too, except you never read this blog (which is a good thing because he might make me take down the bat video) so you won't know about this trouble... Wait... You never read this blog! You get to stay with Mom! Is a little loyalty too much to ask from family? (Don't answer that, Cate.)
As my sister's facebook status says, it just wouldn't be a trip to our parents' house without a bat "situation". Now, I am great in all sorts of crises. Except bats. No bats. No effing bats. So I scream like a twelve year old girl at a Jonas Brothers concert, demanding to be let out of whatever godforsaken room the nasty plague carrying rat with wings- and fangs- has ventured into. And by "demanding" I mean knocking over my poor mother and trampling her as I flee- every bitch for herself. And by "ventured" I mean swooped in and angled straight for me. And did I mention the screaming? I cannot even control the screaming. Hell no. Bats? Hell no.
Don't believe me? As proof I offer the following video. My sister is the one behind the camera. The red fringe is the blanket she kept resolutely over her head for several minutes after the bat had finally departed. My father is the brave one in boxers who I dragged out of sleep with my screeched, "If I have to suffer through this, he does, too!" I? Am the one you can barely hear yelling from behind the closed door of another room. Please excuse the language (and screaming)- but there was an effing bat in the house.
One evening of our trip, we go to a fantastic mexican restaurant. They make a margarita to end all margaritas. Normally I'm a frozen margarita girl because it needs to be frozen to cover up the nasty syrupy mess that most places serve. This one is excellent on the rocks, no salt necessary.
At one point, a woman comes over and says "Quieres mas? You have limonda o agua?" Now, as I have neither lemonade nor water, I pay no attention. (Or maybe it's because I'm nose-deep in my big-ass margarita glass.) Until I notice there's been no response.
"Uh, Alex," I say. "Do you want more lemonade?" "Oh. Sure." He passes his glass over, and I look curiously at Sam. "Why are we not responding to the waitress?" "Well I know I didn't get what she was asking." Huh. Over the years, I've tried to maintain some semblance of the remedial Spanish I took in high school. Paid off, I guess, as I barely notice the Spanish-English merging that she uses as she comes and goes from our table. I'm sure she's dumbing it down (Enlish-ing it up?) some, but I'm still understanding her perfectly. I'm proud of (read: full of) myself for my bad-ass bilingual-ness. Even from the bottom of my second delicious big-ass margarita.
And then we end up at Wendy's a few nights later. "Welcome-to-Wendy's-I'll-take-your-order-whenever-you're-ready-unless-of-course-you're-a-dumbass-gringo-in-which-case-you're-not-understanding-a-word-of-this-and-I-will-treat-you-like-crap," comes through the speaker. In Spanish. I assume. Because I? Don't speak a single word of Spanish. Apparently.
"Uhm... hi?... Can I... get two orders of nuggets?... And..." "Anything else?" she says. I'm sorry? Since when does "and" mean "I'm not in the middle of a sentence"? I know I'm slow here, but I'm thinking of how effed-up "nuggets de pollo" would sound. Eventually I finish and she gives us our total- I think?- and, we assume, asks us to pull up. Except I can't understand a word she says in English, either. I'm so flustered that I screw up the order and have to ask her to add on some junior bacon cheeseburgers at the window.
Now this is a personal insult. Right? It must be because the holy-bitch grows fangs. Sam hands over what I believe is way too much money, but it must not have been because we only get a dollar and change back. Huh. But then frostys come through the window (wee!), and then she yells at us. Something about nuggets de pollo? She shuts the window and Sam stares at me. "Pull up?" I say. It's really an odd sensation, the combination of fear, confusion, and growing pissed-off-ness. The woman is being heinous, but she's holding my nuggets de pollo hostage, y'all.
Eventually she comes out and- I am not kidding- throws the bags of food through the car window before dashing back into the restaurant. Thank god we got our frostys before we pulled up. And pissed-off wins the emotion battle that has been roiling within me. Heinous-holy-bitch is lucky because Sam is the one in the driver's seat and pulls away before I can go jump the woman.
It's not until we're almost back to the hotel eight miles on the other side of the crap-gangville-strip that we had to traverse (at ten-thirty at night) to get there (because of the lying-liar signs at the exit that said Wendy's was right here) that I found the receipt stapled to the bag. She had short-changed us by ten bucks. If I didn't live two thousand miles away? She and I would have words. Of course, we wouldn't be able to understand each other...
We're currently on the road, traveling across the country. As I'm writing this- writing, mind you, not uploading- we are in Iowa. Which, by the way, the conversation I just had with Sam went: "The hell, where are we? Illinois?" "Iowa! What the hell? Oh no, are you writing a blog entry?"
An hour ago, I was going to say that the most exciting thing that had happened so far in this trip was getting a suite at the motel, enabling us to actually shut a door between us and the kids. Now? Emily has conveniently topped that excitement with one of her own making.
We just stopped at the "Mississippi Valley Welcome Center". It had a view- ish- of Ol' Miss, a little shop full of that random crap you see in touristy places, a playground (thank you hay-zeus), and plenty of picnic tables.
We had our lunch and the kids went exploring down a path in the woods. Grampa carefully put the fear of poison ivy into their heads, and I followed up with a "Stay ON the path!", which was well bordered with (their) knee high undergrowth. It wasn't long before Emily was screaming. Now, I don't mean that arguing-screaming or attention-screaming. Fear-and-pain-screaming.
We tore down the path to find that they had strayed away from the path onto a fallen tree. Okay, but when I say fallen tree, I mean the top was touching the ground and the other end was still connected to the stump four feet off the ground, which is precisely where Emily had fallen off of it. And. Ready? Into three foot high nettles. That surrounded the entire tree. For yards and yards in every direction.
Luckily, Grampa was not dressed like me in a short dress and flip flops and could wade in and retrieve the now screaming-crying-snotting poor little girl. Turns out she is as allergic to nettles as I am. Blistery looking hives were appearing all over her.
I ran ahead to the parking lot and grabbed my first-aid kit, as did Grandma.
Grampa and I slathered her with every non-sting non-itch wash, cream, and roll-on that we could find. As prepared as I thought my first-aid kit was (it sure cost a helluva lot to build), I didn't have a single antihistamine, child or adult, but Grandma and Grampa went and bought some.
An hour later, she is nearly hive free. Emily asked why she had gotten covered on both arms and both legs but none had gotten on her face. She was as surprised as the rest of us. The girl has had two emergency room visits for facial injuries, not to mention she had killed a baby tooth and permanently marred an adult tooth years before it ever erupted. "Because, for once," I said to her, patting her back, "you actually protected your face."
Somehow it came about that Emily decided she could jump up and down, while holding onto the arm of a chair, for a full hour.
My father-in-law started timing it for her.
Emily: What'll you give me if I do it?
Phil: I'll give you all the money I have in this pocket.
Emily: I'll bet you don't even have any money in that pocket.
Phil: Maybe I have a hundred dollar bill!
At the six minute mark, Emily groaned and collapsed.
Phil: I suppose I get to keep my hundred dollars.
Emily: I suppose you can't even show me those hundred dollars!
She's currently trying again.
Did you know (and this is going to be a really big revelation here, folks) that if you inflate the tires on a dolly, it actually works better? Sam, father-in-law, and brother-in-law found this out the... easy way? I dunno, what do you call it when someone decides to make his own life easier rather than harder? This, of course, was only after they moved the first 300 pound tree stump up the hill. With flat tires. And swearing. That qualifies as the hard way, I suppose. The easy way almost turned Thanksgiving Day into ER Day when Sam was practically run over when they started up with the second tree stump, envisioning the same resistance.
Also, I helped. You know, in that way you see the wife on the sitcom "helping", making the husband repeatedly move the sofa around the living room in search of the perfect arrangement. Only I did it at the top of my voice from the driveway. Plus sarcasm. And some snark. And maybe the bent over at the waist laughing my ass off didn't help the situation. But, hell, someone has to oversee these operations.
