Barry was a bust...

This is as close as I got... 

No, I did not get onstage with Barry. Apparently, he doesn't do that anymore, which is crazy to me! He has done it for every concert in the last 20 years, and when I finally have the PERFECT strategy to get up there, he changes his show. It sucked, let me tell you. We still had signs, and when my friend held one up, he blew her a kiss. And of course, I rushed the stage at one point, when I saw him start dancing with a woman in the front row. I figured if he was going to be dancing with anyone to Copacabana, it was going to be ME!!! So the best I got was him standing on the stage in front of me dancing. Big Stinking Deal - I wanted to BE ONSTAGE!!! Now I'm going to have to cross it off of my Lifetime To Do List.

Oh well, the concert was still awesome and Vegas was an absolute blast! Believe me, I have a couple of stories that I will be posting as soon as I fully recover! ;)

Blogging Brilliance 5.26.05

Okay.......I came clean with the Barry Manilow thing. Talk about puking up the deep dark secret. So what is yours?

WHAT IS YOUR GUILTY PLEASURE? THE ONE THING THAT MOST PEOPLE WOULD PROBABLY MAKE FUN OF, IF THEY KNEW?

Come on...we're (mostly) anonymous here...Spill it!


(By the way, I finished my signs tonight...They're AWESOME!!!)

Pet Peeve # I don't know, I think I'm on 4...

This should be entitled - "Rude People Suck..."

My youngest daughter is in elementary school, and if you have a child of that age, you probably know about the morning "drop-off circle." It's a loop in the parking lot where parents drive in, the kid hops out of the car, closes the door and the parent goes on their merry way. At our school, if this process takes more than fifteen seconds per car, there is an enormous backup of cars out onto the road, coming from both directions. Every morning my daughter and I get a good laugh from parents who make their kids put their backpacks in the trunk of the car or the back of the SUV, so they have to get out of the car to help them, basically annoying every other parent in line. We even have pet names for every parent who annoys us by doing this, such as "old, wrinkly, embarrassing dad," or "hunchback mom." Don't even get us started on the 20 soccer-mom driven white SUV's all in a row. We're so conscious of people having to wait behind us that when it's our turn to stop, sometimes I just yell, "I'm not coming to a complete stop, so Drop and Roll, baby - DROP and ROLL!!" My daughter usually responds with a completely blank "what are you smoking?" kind of stare. She doesn't think that's as funny as I do.
This morning we were about #5 in line for drop off when a mom gets out of her van, walks around to the passenger side and starts talking to another parent standing on the curb. For five minutes!! She seriously let an entire line of twenty cars, lined up out the parking lot and down the street, wait for her to finish her conversation. No one ever expects anyone to be quite so inconsiderate, so they are usually too close to the car in front of them to ease their way around them. We were all stuck. Remember I live in suburbia at it's finest, so honking at anyone while in the school parking lot would be like strangling a puppy in front of the kindergarten class.
You just don't do it.
So after the rude van mom finally leaves, two other cars who already made their kids get out leave the line behind her, and now I'm #2. The white sedan in front of me stops, two boys get out and then stand in the parking lot talking to their mom from the back passenger door for like five more minutes! You just don't DO this while people are lining up down the street! I was so pissed. I had my daughter jump out of the car and now she was standing on the top stair that leads up to the school waiting to wave goodbye to me as I drove away, like she does every morning (trust me...I know, she is SUCH a cutie!!). You could see people starting to squirm in their seats, and one of the boys kept nervously looking back at me, knowing that his mom was being incredibly inconsiderate. The line is now backed up down both sides of the street and the buses can't pull up to the curb to drop the kids off, because they can't GET to the curb. Now, I realize that five minutes out of my day is not a big deal. Even twice in one morning. In fact, I'm always half an hour early to work because I really do have that much time in the morning after dropping my daughter off. So theoretically I have very little to complain about. But, seriously, does she just not give a shit about the line of people waiting on HER? So finally, in the serene, tree-lined, peaceful elementary school parking lot, not to mention a long line of politically correct, SUV driving, physically and chemically altered stay-at-home soccer moms (and in front of my sweet little girl looking on), I LAID on my horn!
It was beautiful, I must say! But, of course, instead of that woman being known as the rude bitch in the white Camry, I will forever be known as the rude bitch in the silver Cabrio, but hey...I can handle that.

Can't Smile Without HIM!!

Oh, yeah....... 

I'm a closet Fanilow. There. I said it. I spent years in therapy before I could finally admit it to my closest friends. I love him. Completely. Yes, I KNOW he's gay. It's not about that. It's about his voice. It's about his corny songs. It's about the fact that on Saturday night, MAY 28, 2005, I WILL be singing on stage with Barry Manilow!! Mark your calendars.

I've been a Fanilow since I was very young. My sister and I first heard 'I Write The Songs' on our Too-Da-Loop Radios when all we could get was AM (mine was yellow, hers was red, and they were way cool). That's when it all began - my secret love of all things Barry. My first album - yes, vinyl - was Even Now. I hid my love for Barry from everyone but my family all through high school and college. When my first daughter was just a baby, I taped a televised concert and would sit on the bed watching it over and over, singing all the songs to her, and it would put her to sleep. Of course I took this as a sign that we had a mutual love for Barry, but she was probably just really bored. My friends know about my obsession and, after ridiculing me for awhile, actually enable my problem by buying me CD's and other assorted Barry paraphanalia.
That's friendship.

My sister is also a Barry fan, but not quite as extreme as me. She's turning 40 on Friday, and to celebrate, we're heading to Vegas to see Barry live at the Hilton, where he now has his own room. The show is called "MANILOW: MUSIC AND PASSION!!" Cheesy? Hell, yeah! I'm looking forward to the cheese. Can't wait.

I have a Lifetime To Do List that I take very seriously. It has some things that I would really love to do, such as finish a marathon and run with the bulls in Pamplona. It has some things that I've already done, such as trekking in the Andes and climbing the Great Wall of China. Then there are those things that I MUST do before I die. I'm not kidding - getting onstage with Barry Manilow tops that list.

So here's how I get on stage...At every concert, Barry chooses one woman from the audience to come on stage with him and sing "I Can't Smile Without You." I've been to countless Barry concerts and I think I know how to guarantee my spot onstage. Women who get onstage usually have big signs that they hold up when the time comes (I would disclose what will be on my sign, but I can't take the chance that any of you are thinking of going and stealing my sure-fire idea). There are five of us going and, trust me, ALL of our signs will be focused on getting ME onstage. We paid WAY too much money for our tickets to make sure we're right up front, and I've already warned everyone involved that if he picks anyone in my party OTHER THAN ME, I will TAKE THEM OUT to get on stage instead of them. I don't care that it's my sister's birthday, I will TAKE HER OUT if he picks her instead. I will ruthlessly trample her skinny little ass to get on stage with Barry. She understands this and has wisely agreed to step aside.

I'm hoping that my platinum membership in the Barry Manilow International Fan Club (BMIFC for short) will help to secure my spot in Fanilow history.

Trust me...I'll keep you posted.

Tagged again!

By LIBBY!

I'm passing on the tag to...
The Muse
Nicole and
Rob Lowe. Yeah, really...THAT Rob Lowe. Check it out.

I think I'm supposed to pick five from the list. My five with the answers are below...

If I could be a scientist...
If I could be a farmer...
If I could be a doctor...
If I could be a painter...
If I could be a missionary...
If I could be a lawyer...
If I could be a writer...
If I could be a llama rider...
If I could be a bonnie pirate...
If I could be an astronaut...
If I could be a justice on any one court in the world...

If I could be a professor...I WOULD GIVE MY STUDENTS THE FINAL EXAM ON THE FIRST DAY, WITH THE ENTIRE SEMESTER TO FIND THE ANSWERS. ISN'T A FINAL EXAM JUST A SYNOPSIS OF WHAT NEEDS TO BE LEARNED THROUGHOUT THE SEMESTER? WHY PLAY GAMES?

If I could be an athlete...WELL, I ALREADY CONSIDER MYSELF SOMEWHAT OF AN ATHLETE, BUT IF WE'RE TALKING PROFESSIONAL, I WOULD BE A PRO TENNIS PLAYER (AND MY ASS WOULD NOT BE FLABBY).

If I could be an innkeeper...IT WOULD BE SOMEWHERE ON THE CENTRAL OR NORTHERN COAST OF CALIFORNIA. THE EAST COAST WOULD BE BEAUTIFUL, BUT TOO COLD IN THE WINTER. IT WOULD BE VERY SMALL, ONLY A FEW GUESTS, AND I WOULD COOK ALL THE MEALS FOR THEM, INCLUDING FORMAL DINNERS EVERY NIGHT.

If I could be a gardener...THEN MY INN WOULD BE EVEN MORE BEAUTIFUL, WOULDN'T IT? IF I WERE A GARDENER, MY HOUSE WOULD BE SURROUNDED BY DARK PURPLE FLOWERS. AND CLIMBING JASMINE.

If I could be a world famous blogger...WHAT? I'M NOT ALREADY?

Murder in Pleasantville

I was watching the 11:00 news last night when I heard the newscaster say something about murder affecting a quiet little south Orange County community. I thought it was strange, since I live in a quiet little south Orange County community, and started listening a little more closely. When they came back from a commercial, there was a newscaster reporting live from down the street!!

Check it out...
Murder in Pleasantville

I've said before that I live in Pleasantville. Seriously. It's a private community, one way in, one way out. Very small, very close-knit. I'm talking Wonder Years all the way. It's basically a little loop of streets with probably three blocks of houses and that's it. It's so safe that people wait years to get into my neighborhood. Everyone around here knows about it and when I mention where I live, they invariably say, "Oh...you live THERE? I LOVE that neighborhood! How much do the houses cost there?"

So after hearing the newscast, I decide to investigate. I walked outside with my cell phone in hand (the murderer was still on the loose, so I was ready to call 911) and looked for the camera crews. They lied about being live because they were not in front of the house on the news. I was a little disappointed - I wanted the scoop. There was, however, a police helicopter circling above the neighborhood. So as I'm walking back into my house, I thought, "Oh no! What if the murderer entered my house while I was down the street?!" Damn! Now I was going to have to check every single room, under every bed, every closet before I could rest. By now it's 11:30 and there's no way I'm getting to sleep.

The good news is, several people today have already told me that the murderer was found this morning not too far away. Apparently, he went home and killed himself after he killed the other guy. Whew!

Blogging Brilliance 5.18.05

Here's another question that I would love to know your answers to....

(By the way, naming these posts "Blogging Brilliance" has nothing to do with the concept - it's all about your answers!)

WHAT IS YOUR FAVORITE LINE FROM A SONG?

Even if you don't know the title or who sings it - throw it out there and someone else may.

I apologize to my friends who have heard this already so many times, but here's mine...

"I'm gonna find myself a girl
who can show me what laughter means,
and we'll fill in the missing colors
in each other's paint-by-number dreams..."

~Jackson Browne, The Pretender

What's your favorite?

Couple Thoughts From Tonight's ACM Awards...

1. No matter how bad we wish it were true...Kenny Chesney is NOT hot.

2. Faith Hill's hairstylist MUST be fired.

3. At 50 years old, Reba McEntire's window for wearing tight leather pants has passed.

I've Been Tagged!!!!

By Bridget Jones!

Here are my questions...

Three names I go by:
1. Steph
2. Mommy
3. Boo (Only to my older sister!)

Three screen names that I have had:
1. Queenb
2. Calchick859
3. stephf

Three things I like about myself:
1. Sense of humor
2. Temperament
3. My hair (superficial, I know)

Three things I don't like about myself:
1. I'm a procrastinator
2. Naive at times
3. I'm a really bad housekeeper

Three parts of my heritage:
1. Mexican
2. Danish
3. Scottish

Three things that scare me:
1. Something happening to my girls
2. Leaving this life without fulfilling my purpose
3. Hurting someone

Three of my everyday essentials:
1. A drive-thru Coke in the morning
2. Love from my daughters
3. At least on episode of Law & Order

Three things I am wearing right now:
1. White girly T-Shirt
2. Light blue drawstring pants (think scrubs)
3. Nope, that's it

Three of my fave bands or musical artists:
1. Kenny Chesney
2. Jennifer Knapp
3. Bruce Springsteen

Three of my fave songs:
1. Jungleland (Springsteen)
2. Refine Me (Knapp)
3. Anything But Mine (Chesney)

Three new things I want to try in the next 12 months:
1. Get my own territory in my new job
2. Mosaics
3. Actually MAKING it to the gym on a consistent basis

Three things I want in a relationship:
1. Unfailing loyalty
2. Honesty
3. Trust

Two truths and a lie:
1. I've been thrown in a Mexican jail twice
2. I've stowed away on a cruise ship
3. I'm a member of Mensa

Three physical things that attract me to the opposite sex:
1. Presence
2. Confidence
3. Kindness

Three things I can't do without:
1. Computer
2. My hair straightener
3. Family/Friends

Three of my fave hobbies:
1. Reading
2. My kids sports
3. Creating things (painting, cooking, think Martha Stewart without the bitchy side or the prison record)

Three places I want to go on vacation:
1. Africa
2. Virgin Islands
3. Carmel (been there a million times - can't get enough of it)

Three things I just can't do:
1. Eat Indian food
2. Laugh quietly
3. Pretend that Shania Twain has talent

Three kids' names:
1. Olivia
2. Julianne
3. Only have two

Three things I want to do before I die:
1. Visit all seven continents
2. Get on stage with Barry Manilow (more about this to follow...)
3. Find the love of my life

Three celeb crushes: (Remember, I'm old)
1. James Caveizal (before he played Jesus, now it just seems wrong)
2. Pierce Brosnan
3. Sean Cassidy (Come on...I said I was old. I never really got over it!)

Alright, now I have to tag someone...and I choose:

JENNI!,
CHARLIE!, AND...
NOELLE!!

Go for it, guys!!!

One Very Brief Thought on 'Survivor'...

Don't you think it's funny that we find entertainment in a show that takes a bunch of hard core Americans to a foreign country, forces everyone to survive on their wits, strength, determination and resourcefulness and then picks a 'winner?' And they find the most remote areas on earth to make it more interesting.

The funny thing is that in most of these places, I'm sure there are indigenous people groups watching from a distance thinking, "You survive living MY LIFE for a few weeks and if you Outwit, Outplay, and Outlast the other nineteen whimps you brought with you, you win a million bucks? FUCK YOU!!"

Blogging Brilliance 5.15.05

I'm shamelessly stealing this idea from another blog and just sort of adapting it. I saw three questions on someone else's blog and literally lists of them on someone else's and I thought they were cool. Can't do a list or even three at a time, but I can do one at a time.

I'll ask the question and give my answers, but I want to hear everyone else's too.

I'll start with one that allows all of us to be egocentric...


TELL ME THREE THINGS THAT YOU LOVE ABOUT YOURSELF...

Here are mine.
1. I love that I have the ability to find humor in everything, and my outlook on life often helps people I care about to take life a little less seriously also.

2. I love that I'm not just happy but truly joyful. People who are just happy are constantly searching and striving to hang onto that which makes them happy. Joyful people have it regardless of their circumstances, possessions, or relationships.

3. I love that I'm a great mom. I don't take that lightly or for granted. And I'm not making it up, I promise! :) I get that piece of info from my kids, the only one's whose opinions really matter. I realize, however, that that may come and go depending on their perception of me. Here's a conversation that took place yesterday between me and my 14 year old (when I was pondering this very question, by the way)...
My cell phone rings as I'm pulling into my neighborhood, my 14 year old is just dragging herself out of bed...

14 Year Old Punk: Hi Mommy. Will you stop by Juice Stop and get me a #15?
Steph: No, I'm already pulling in. By the way, how would you rate me as a mom on a scale of 1 to 10?
P: Are you kidding?
S: No, seriously, how would you rate me, 10 being the best. You can be honest.
P: A 10, duh.
S: Really?! How sweet! Thanks, baby! (All smiles!)
P: Are you kidding? You're a great mom. Wanna know how you can be a 20?
S: Yeah!
P: Stop by Juice Stop and get me a #15.

I also love that some guy at a BBQ last night thought I was 25 years old, but that's beside the point.

Okay, I want to hear yours...

A Fun Filled Friday Night with the Fabulous Fearless Flyer

Yup. Boy do I know how to party. I've always known I was an exceptionally social and fun loving human being. And what says that louder than a Friday night at home with my Trader Joe's Fearless Flyer, which I have not only read from cover to cover on this beautiful and exciting Friday night, but actually taken the time to circle items that I just don't get.

For example, the Par-Baked Half Ciabatta. ?? You got me.

Cocktail Tomatoes on the Vine. Okay, I get that they're tomatoes, but cocktail? I've heard of Cocktail Parties, Cocktail Sauce, Molotov Cocktails, even Cocktail Weenies. But Cocktail Tomatoes? Are they going to make my martini's taste a little healthier?

Organic Sparkling Lemonade. Who cares? Apparently, this lemonade was made in small batches, maybe so every little lemon felt valued.

The worst part about this week's Fearless Flyer is that it only has two bottles of wine on sale. That's barely worth opening. Usually you get at least two or three pages. If I make a trip all the way out there, I'll probably pick up one of each (remember...I DO know how to party, after all), but I'll probably just stock up on the Two-Buck Chuck. I realize that in most parts of the country it's Three-Buck Chuck, but the fact that it's a dollar per bottle less here is the only thing that's keeping my spirits up about my Fun Filled Friday Night with the Fabulous Fearless Flyer. Hope you guys are all having as much fun as me!

Any lawyers out there?

I don't own my home - I rent. I live in a little suburb in southern California that I affectionately refer to as Pleasantville. The houses are all Cape Cod style (not easy to pull off on the west coast, but here it works), each one has a white picket fence in front (required by the HOA) and a weather vane. My neighbors spend their weekends working on their yards, having BBQ's in their driveways so the other neighbors know they're invited, and we even have an annual neighborhood block party put on by a local realtor because our neighborhood is so stinkin' cute. The feeling of community in the neighborhood is huge, as is pride of ownership. Then there's my house. Think Brady Bunch landscaping, a garage door that has a fungus (I was told by an expert) and is drooping, and when the HOA got on my landlord to paint last year, instead of matching the pretty blue with white trim, the painters made it this ugly slate grey color. My landlord doesn't like to be bothered with repairs or replacing anything that doesn't need it. I pay $2000 (!) per month in rent, and along with the other utilities I would expect to pay for, I also have to pay for water, trash and the gardener. He is so frickin' cheap that I have lived for days with having to turn the water off at the main every time someone had to even use the bathroom because he wouldn't settle for any quotes from prospective plumbers. My heat went out two years ago in the winter (yes, I realize I live in CA and what am I whining for?)and again, he was not satisfied with anyone's quotes.

I live about a mile from my office so it's easy to run home at lunch if I need something, which I did one day last week. I walked in to find that the sliding glass door leading out to my backyard had been shattered. There was a hole about the size of a basketball in the center and the rest of the safety glass was broken and slowly falling off. I had hired a new gardener who started that morning. I called a glass company and then my landlord, who was convinced that a rock had flown up from the lawnmower. I was bummed because I hadn't seen my yard looking this good for quite sometime and now I was going to have an issue with the gardener if he knowingly left it like that. So I called the gardener who met me at my house and basically denied all responsibility for it. I can't prove it, so nothing I can do. Back to my landlord...I didn't have the money to write a check up front for it, and I was a little wary of taking financial responsibility for it, so my landlord gave me his credit card number the next day to give the glass people.

Yesterday I'm at home and the phone rings. My 10 year old answers it, hands me the phone and says, "It's the slumlord." (love her!) He tells me to read my lease and let him know what I think about Article 16 or some other bullshit, basically saying that he thinks I am financially responsible for the repair. I don't think so. He said, "Well if you have people over and something gets broken..." I pretty much cut him off and said, "I wasn't having a party. I was paying someone to take care of YOUR fricking property!!" I can be very eloquent. Anyway, he told me to ask around and find out what the protocol is on this. Like I'm going to say I asked around and I found out I need to pay for it!

Anybody have any experience on this? Opinions? Voo-doo dolls in the shape of my slumlord?

Now I'm pissed.

I just spent 20 minutes writing a new post and the stupid sytem went down without saving it. That's not good.

Thank God!

Found this on Nicole's Blog, who must have been taking this test when she should have been doing her homework. ;)

I am: 2% Republican.

"You're a complete liberal, utterly without a trace of Republicanism. Your strength is as the strength of ten because your heart is pure. (You hope.)"

Are You A Republican?

Because I was raised in south Orange County (a truly Republican state), I suppose it's impossible to wash off that last 2%, so I guess I'll learn to live with it.

"Alcohol..."

I'm not a huge Brad Paisley fan, but I couldn't resist this one...lyrics to his new song...especially the highlighted portion.

I can make anybody pretty.
I can make you believe any lie.
I can make you pick a fight with somebody twice your size.
Well, I’ve been known to cause a few break-ups,
An' I’ve been known to cause a few births.
Well, I can make you new friends,
Or get you fired from work.

And since the day I left Milwaukee,
Lynchburg an' Bordeaux, France,
Been making the bars lots of big money,
An' helpin' white people dance.
I got you in trouble in High School,
But College, now that was a ball.
You had some of the best times you’ll never remember with me:
Alcohol!

I got blamed at your wedding reception,
For your best man’s embarrassing speech.
And also for those naked pictures of you at the beach.
I’ve influenced Kings and world leaders,
I helped Hemingway write like he did.
And I’ll bet you a drink or two,
That I can make you put that lampshade on your head.

‘Cause since the day I left Milwaukee,
Lynchburg and Bordeaux, France,
I been making a fool out of folks just like you,
An' helping white people dance.
I am medicine and I am poison,
I can help you up or make you fall.
You had some of the best times you’ll never remember with me:
Alcohol!

Stellar Parenting 101

I am a HUGE fan of Eddie Murphy's Delirious. In high school, my entire tennis team ditched school one day, all nine of us piled into my 914 and went to my house to watch a bootleg copy of the video. To this day my best friend and I will randomly shout out a line from Delirious and start a thirty minute barrage of Eddie Murphy quotes. We both have our personal favorites, but they all crack us up.

Every time the ice cream man comes through our neighborhood, I yell "ICE CREAM!!! ICE CREAM!!" at the top of my lungs and start running around the house frantically looking for my wallet. I've done it for so many years, that my two daughters adopted the habit without ever knowing it's origin. So one day not too long ago, we were waiting impatiently in the driveway for the ice cream truck to appear (we could hear it's bells and knew it was close), and I started doing the hip swaying, ice cream waving "I got some iiice creeeam..." monologue. It was very obnoxious, and at one point a neighbor walked by with his dog and just started cracking up. He knew.
My daughters eventually asked where I got the skit from, and being the stellar parent that I am, I started thinking, "Well, what would it hurt to let them watch JUST the ice cream truck monologue from Delirious?" So after the ice cream man left, we went inside and popped in the DVD (again, a hot copy, because you can't get it on DVD legally. But I digress...). Of course I raced past the first 15 minutes which, if you're going to be offended by the DVD, that's the part that will do it, and we watched the ice cream skit in hysterics! But while scanning the DVD, I came across the Michael Jackson impression, and it IS hysterical, so again I thought, "Well, what would it hurt...?" Then the Elvis impression, the Bathtub scene (where Eddie ends up with GI Joe up his ass :), Aunt Bunny falling down the stairs (who can forget "Goonie Goo Goo?"), and OF COURSE...The Family Cookout!!! Why would I want to deprive my girls of such classic comedy, even if they are young and incredibly impressionable?! I think it's just good parenting! So in return for my innovative approach to raising children, and sharing an integral piece of my own history, I now have a ten year old who does a killer Elvis impression (including the "Thank you, thank you very much!" while waving away an imaginary fart), and a fourteen year old who, every time she and I have a discussion that's getting WAY too serious, points her finger at me and yells, "I know you're seven! I know you're seven! But you're gonna be a seven year old, no-home, walking-the-dog mother f*&%er!!"

Stellar Parenting 101.

HA! Jenn & Charlie...

At first I was pissed that you forced me to get competitive. But here you go...




The sad thing is, considering the age difference, I'll still be gone before you.

Annoying People

I love to tell stories and I find it very hard to do so in 50 words or less. I realize this. But do you ever find yourself listening to someone tell a story that has absolutely no value and they make it last for like an hour?
I was out last night with some friends and this guy starts telling a story that I had no interest in whatsoever. It was really self-serving, so he was basically just bragging about whatever. I'm not rude, I can hang for the first 30 minutes or so, but at one point he actually said, "To make a long story short..." And I yelled, "TOO LATE!!!" (Did I just say I'm not rude? Oops.)

OH MY GOD...I'M GOOD!!! Pathetic...but good.

I just spent the last hour trying to get Sideline Links on my blog and I DID IT!!! I'm so computer illiterate I can't believe it. There are so many more I want to add, but I broke out in a sweat just getting those on. I wish I were kidding. Seriously, it took me ten tries to get it right.
I have a friend who came in from Chicago last night who I was supposed to be spending Cinco de Mayo with tonight - WHO FLAKED! His name is John, by the way, in case any of you run into him, feel free to give him crap for flaking. Can't miss him - tall, cute, looks like Chandler from Friends, only ten times as funny. By the way, Jenn...It's John from our Chicago office - yup - flake! (I'm sure he'll be reading this upon returning to Chicago. If not, Melinda, can you please handle that for me?) So what do I do? Of course, I call up my ex-boyfriend and ask what he's doing tonight because I knew I'd be welcome with him and his friends and not a pathetic, stay at home, stood-up geek on Cinco de Mayo, who has nothing better to do than break out into a sweat while figuring out her Sideline Links.
But at least I DID IT!!!!!

I Wish I Could Blame the Alcohol...

Jenn and Charlie's blogs have inspired me to tell this not-so-drunk story. I wish I could blame it on alcohol, but I'm weird enough to do this sober. Awhile back I was at a restaurant with my friend Jennifer (not the Jenn of Swank or Skank fame, although I did spend an awesome birthday with her and a crazy Elvis impersonator - see Jenn's February Archives), and our dates. We were sitting on a patio out in front and went to the bathroom in the back of the restaurant. To get to the bathroom, we had to walk through the patio, the indoor restaurant and the bar. While we were in there, we started laughing about people who walk out with toilet paper stuck to their shoe and how the nice thing to do is tell someone if that's going on. So as we're basically laughing at the misfortune of others, we decide to see if anyone would be that kind to one of us. We hatched a plan for me to take a long peice of toilet paper, stick it in the waist band of my skirt and see if anyone would tell me. I was wearing black from head to toe and the toilet paper was white, so it was perfect. I crumpled it up and got it all wrinkled so it looked used, and tucked into my waistband. I'm not very tall, so the toilet paper came all the way down below the back of my knees. It took us at least ten minutes to get our straight faces on before we could walk out. Jen said she had to go first because if she was behind me she would start laughing. A couple of the girls in the bathroom wanted our phone numbers, because they thought we were so funny, they now wanted to be our friends. Off I went...I started through the bar with the toilet paper swinging behind me. I kept a totally straight face, even made serious eye contact with several guys as though I were the hottest girl in the place, knowing that they all saw the toilet paper and thought the joke was on me. I then had to cross through the inside portion of the restaurant before reaching the patio and by now a well-meaning waitress had spotted me. She ran after me but didn't catch me before I reached the outside patio, and eventually my seat. Jen was already there and laughing hysterically. I made it to the table and, after holding it in the whole way back from the bathroom, slumped into my chair and put my head down in my hands. I was laughing so hard that all that was coming out were hysterical sobs, which confused the poor waitress as to the severity of the situation. She had been trying to save me from massive amounts of embarrassment and she thought she was too late. She thought I was crying and looked frantically at my date, and when he was smiling, realized something fishy was going on. She cried, "She knew, right?! She was kidding right?!" Poor girl.

I Know I'm Going To Hell For This...

...but I really resent that I have to spend too much money on a Hallmark card, some sort of present, and a lame flower arrangement for a mom I don't even get along with. This is the problem with Hallmark Holidays. Because of all the crap they advertise on TV and in every store you walk into, my mom expects a certain caliber of gift on Mother's Day. It's not like I'm harboring any secret resentment towards her, or holding any grudges for a crappy childhood. We just don't get along. We never have. I pretty much maintain a relationship with her because my kids love her and I don't want my feelings to affect their relationship. My brother and sister were smart enough to move far far away (thanks guys), so the pressure is on me. The problem is that I have the least money of all of us, and my mom's litmus test for a good day is "How much money was spent on making sure that my day was special?" Same thing on her birthday every year.
I'm a mom now - have been for 14 years, actually. Yet all of my energy on this day goes into making sure that she somehow feels valued, to avoid the inevitable meltdown if she doesn't.
Part of me feels really crappy about this. If you were to ask my mom about our relationship, you would get a very different story. And if I ever need help, she's there for me. I just knew, from a very young age, that moms and daughters should have a very different relationship than what we had. We're just two people that are so different yet somehow thrown together for life.
Am I being crappy?

I got diet again.

What the hell?! It's not rocket science.

See Pet Peeve #2 (HA! I'm such a linker! :)

Holy Korean Day Spa, Batman!

I've put off writing this for a couple of days because I'm still trying to get over the feeling of being violated.
My girlfriends and I went to a Korean Day Spa on Sunday for the Body Scrub/Oil Massage package. For 70 bucks, it seemed like the best deal in town. We've done day spas before. In fact, my friend Michelle is a massage therapist, so I'm rather spoiled in the massage department. This, however, was unlike anything I've ever experienced. We went to a spa where you could use the other facilities before your scheduled appointment time. We decide to jump in the spa, use the sauna and salt room (don't ask). There were three of us in the beginning, and a fourth friend showed up a little later. So Michelle, Remy and myself show up, change into our bathing suits and hit the jacuzzi. We walk in and we are literally the only three people with a stitch of clothing on. We stuck out like a sore thumb. I felt like I had just walked into a Roman bath house. The only towels being used were wrapped around women's heads. Of course everyone was staring at us wondering why these crazy white women were being such prudes. So in the sauna, I looked at my friends and said, "You guys...we're gonna have to get naked." Our friend Susie walked in and she didn't think to bring a bathing suit, so she just stripped right down. Next was Michelle, but if I had her body, I'd be showing it off too. Pretty soon we're all naked. That was just the beginning.
Next came the treatments. By now we're all walking around naked and they call us into a back room for the body scrub. There were no private rooms, no dividers, no sheets on the tables, just three tables in one room that we had to lie down on to get scrubbed. My friends and I have no secrets left. The woman who was doing my scrub got every square inch of my body. And she was not shy about how she was going to reach every square inch of my body. I'm much more limber than I thought. She now knows me better than my ex-husband. I snuck a peek over at Michelle to check out what her woman was doing and based on what I saw, I think mine was doing a particularly thorough job. I think it's time to take her home to meet the folks. She rinsed me off by throwing buckets of hot water over me, while I was still on the table.
Next came the oil massage. The woman rubs me down with liquid soap and sends me off to the shower, which was just a spout coming out of the wall in the middle of the room. And apparently she thought every part of me needed a little exfoliating, because I was washing body scrub out of every nook and cranny. Like I said, I have no secrets left. I returned to my table and lay on my stomach while the woman pours about a gallon of baby oil on me and starts rubbing. It was surreal. I tried to relax, but couldn't when I realized that she was actually straddling me on the table and now had her knees in my butt! Keep in mind, I'm laying in a puddle of oil and all I can think is that when she goes sliding off the table, she better not grab onto me on her way down! I had a visual of my oily naked body sprawled on top of the poor massage therapist on the tile floor. It was not pretty. So after awhile, she's standing up by my head massaging my back, and here's the best part...she actually leans over and slaps my ass!!! Yeah, you read that right. I'm thinking, "Did that just happen?" And she does it again. To be fair, she then slapped other parts of my body too, with her hands kind of cupped. From what I understand some massage therapists do this for circulation or something, I don't know. She just happened to hit my butt first and I thought I was getting way more than I paid for. Then I hear Michelle get slapped and then our friend Susie, and pretty soon all I can hear is a giant slap-fest going on in the room while these women slapped our entire bodies. She also massaged my entire body, and for awhile I thought she was checking for lumps. The best part was when she was done with the massage, she slid my body up to the head of the table so my head was sort of hanging off, and washed my hair right there on the table. She even used this little massaging brush on my head, which was the least weird thing that she pulled out all day.
When the whole thing was over and we were all showering in the community shower, my newly liberated friends and I were speechless for several minutes. My friends are rather conservative and I consider it my job to shock them occassionally with random comments. So while we're all standing around, wondering if there's a support group for Women Violated by Body Scrub, I said, "All I know is that if someone is going to slap my ass like that, they better be buying me dinner first."

Things I Don't Get...

1. Donald Trump's hair. Or any bad comb-over for that matter. Yeah, I know his hair has been severly scrutinized, especially since The Apprentice came on, but has anyone been able to explain it sufficiently?
2. Why my lights flicker half way but don't go out. Sometimes they just dim. Is there a power outage somewhere? If they only dim, does that just mean there's a power shortage?
3. Brazilian bikini waxes. Enough said.
4. The woman who gives Brazilian bikini waxes.
5. Really chubby girls who wear belly shirts. (Again...I must ask..."Doesn't anyone love them enough..." You know the rest)
6. A business that telemarkets you with a recorded message. Like they can't be bothered to make the call at night, but they expect you to accept it. (I leave a special message for those businesses at the beep...)
7. Carrot Top.
8. Why Brad Pitt would leave Jennifer Aniston for Angelina Jolie when I'm obviously still single.
9. Why I'm still single.
10. When I got old enough to have a daughter who steals my clothes.
11. Why in the world my beautiful teenage daughter would want to steal my clothes.

I'm sure I'm just scratching the surface here.

I'm Linking!!!

And look who taught me to link...NICOLE!!.

You know what they say about simple minds being easily amused? Yeah.

Good Thing She's Cute...

This conversation actually just took place a few minutes ago when my sister Jen called me at work...

Jen: "HEY! Have you ever wanted to go to Nashville?"
Steph: "Yeah! I would love to go."
Jen: "Cool! I'm thinking that for my birthday, we can use our air miles to get there and ask Dad and Kate to pay for the hotel and a rental car as my birthday present. It won't cost us a thing."
Steph: "Sounds great - I'm in!"
Jen: "We'll fly in, visit Graceland and hang out for the weekend."
Steph: "You know Graceland is in Memphis, right?"

Silence...

Jen: "HEY! Have you ever wanted to go to Memphis?"

And she's the older, smarter one.

In Case You Haven't Noticed...

I'm inept.

I had to e-mail Liz (the cutie in Philly) to figure out how to post a photo on my blog. It's that bad. And now I can't figure out how to post links. I want people to be able to check out your blogs when they hit mine and I don't know how to do it.

I have link envy.

Help me.