Me in Place

We try to take things to a whole new level of class. For instance, today we had 14 family members here for the day/dinner. And when they left, I realized this was still part of my decoration:

You didn’t see it, did you? Mr MIP put a cute little bug in my wreath and it’s been there for the last month or so.

Classy.

Our longest running marriage argument has to do with the following two scenarios. Won’t you help us resolve our issues?

Here’s the first one:

1. You’re at a four-way stop and all the cars arrive at pretty much the same time; who gets to go first? And, in which direction does it then move – A goes, then the person to the right or to the left?

If you want to super analyze it…. is it A – because she’s me and she’s sad and confused about when to go? or B – because she’s a ditzy teenager who is texting, C – cuz if you don’t let him go first, you’re dead? or D – because he’s jabbering with his co-car peeps?

What about this one:

2. You are at a four-way stop and you’re going to go straight. The person in the lane next to you is turning left – can you both leave at the same time? Or do you have to wait…left-turning person goes, then you go?

Here are my Ten Reasons I’ve Used for Quitting a Workout Early at the gym. Feel free to add reasons you’ve used so I can add more options to my arsenal.

1. The lady next to me is humming and singing along with her iPod and I can hear it through my earphones! She’s hunched over. Slowly pushing on that elliptical, singing every fifth word out loud, humming the rest. AAAAAAAHHHHH. I really want to slap her.

2. Ouch.

3. The man next to me is reading the Wall Street Journal on the elliptical. Which is totally irritating because in order to do this, he has to hunch himself over and he’s really not working that hard. So I quit, because I’m annoyed at his level of exertion. (Yes, I understand the irony in this.)

4. I can see SuperBoy smooshing his face on the glass of the big gym where the kids are playing.

5. Fifty-five minutes of working out is almost exactly one hour of working out.

6. Wow. She’s fast. I’m not. I quit.

7. Everybody Loves Raymond is done and now there’s nothing good on the tv.

8. Vanity, vanity, all is vanity. (See Ecclesiastes.)

9. Wow. Didn’t know I had that muscle. Ouch.

10. I’m _______. Fill in the blank with: hungry, thirsty, tired, sweaty, cold, lonely, cute enough already (JOKE alert), bored…

I should probably write this out as well. How about you?

I did something for you yesterday. I bet you weren’t even aware of it, but that’s how giving I am.

Let’s review:

That’s the temp outside yesterday – and so far today. What I’m now wondering is how we came about owning such an overachieving thermometer – -60? 120? Where? When? Is that possible? (Update: I’ve been thinking… maybe he is just a very very nice thermometer – reminding me that it’s never as bad as it could be.)

Anyway, what did I do for you, my friends? I did laundry. Because I thought, hm, if I do all the loads of laundry that are waiting for me, I could potentially raise the outside temp one degree with the dryer exhaust.

That’s right, I saved you from -21 degrees. You’re welcome.

Stay warm.

(My warm cat. Tempo Cat-erina.)

Admit it, how many of you feel, as I do, infernally stupid trying to get faucets to turn on in public restrooms?

They could at least have some sort of light that comes on when the sink’s out of order, so you’re not standing there waving furiously for nothing. My kids have had a fear of self-flushing toilets their whole lives. Those poor little two-year old bottoms would trigger the toilet sensor too early and they would literally scream as the toilet roared to life. I’m lucky I haven’t lost a kid down the toilet (to date). And then the sinks…their hands are smaller, and kids can barely reach the sink, so they are incessantly waving in front of the faucet and it hardly ever comes on for them. Then we turn to the paper towel dispenser…it’s like some sort of prayer object lesson: “The answer could be yes, no or wait!”

Oh, for the good ol’ days. (And don’t even tell me if you don’t wash your hands after using the restroom. I will not ever ever be your friend again.)

NB: By the way, the song playing today is one of my top favorite songs of all time. I thought it kinda went along with the whole waiting for answers to prayer comment.

Poop has taught me a lot about life and what to expect from life and how to deal with the literal and figurative poo life serves up. I’m not talking Pooh bear, I’m talking poo, people. (Forgive me, Grammas).

1. Strangely enough, I rarely smelled my kids’ poopy diapers. I had no problem changing them, didn’t have to leave the room, could ignore it for quite some time, actually. (I can smell other people’s kids, though. Ick.) While everyone else was clearing the room and covering up their noses, I was like, “Hm? What? Dirty diaper?” Lesson: Bad things that happen in life will affect people differently. React to bad things the way you will, don’t let others’ reactions bother you. And be patient with others and their reactions.

2. Poop attracts help. One of the worst poo moments was when my middle child was a baby and her diaper, and all that was in it, exploded at the Omaha Zoo. I had to buy her an outfit from the zoo gift shop, and was changing her and basically giving her a bath in the bathroom sink. By the time I was done, there were three older ladies helping me clean her up, telling me stories of when their kids had messy diapers and giving me pats on the back as encouragement. At first I was embarrassed that they were helping with the poop bomb, but then I told myself to lighten up and I took their help and had a great time in the bathroom of the Omaha Zoo with three grandma helpers. Lesson: Let others help you when poop explodes. Let their life lessons encourage you.

3. I used to try to do my treadmill at home when SuperBoy was little. He was crawling around playing in the basement (on the other side of the room from where the treadmill was). But, no joke, the sound of the treadmill must have triggered something in him to make the diaper fill. So my workouts never got done because I’d stop to change the poop and then never get back on track again. I even blogged about one instance here. SuperBoy’s out of diapers now, but you know what else? I finally joined a gym. This way, when I am working out, I am working out. I am not worried about the poop. Lesson: It’s okay to give yourself a break and relax. The poop will still be there when you’re done. Take a break and breathe.

4. My last lesson today about poop is this: There is never any way to always be prepared for poop. No matter how much of a good, prepared mother I tried to be, there was always a point where I’d be standing there with a naked baby yelling for “Somebody bring me the diaper wipes!” or we’d be out somewhere and the diaper bag wouldn’t have the extra outfit in it. Lesson: You will never be prepared for the poo in life. Bad things are expert at surprising you. There ain’t nothing you can do about it.

Take the good with the bad. Clean up the poop and be strong. It’s worth it.

I am going to admit something strange. I heard a quote the other day and I can’t stop debating about it in my head and when I sit down to write a blog post, it’s all that comes to mind. I can’t write anything else until I ask you your opinion. Ready?

The guy said in relation to working out: Bring the body and the mind will follow.

I don’t know if I agree! On the one hand, yes, get your physical body to exercise or eat right and, yes, there will be positive benefits that hopefully your mind can then click into. On the other hand, I cannot get my physical body out of bed and to the gym unless my mind does its magical insipiration.

Move on to other topics besides working out/eating healthy… what about getting to church? What about getting to the grocery store? What about staying faithful to your spouse? What about not getting angry with your child?

I’m stuck. What do you think?

The other day, my 8yo daughter and I decided we’d stop at the library to get some books. But when we drove up, I noticed the place was a little busier than usual. I also noticed – being as bright as I am – that there were more picketers than usual. Picketing at the library? Using cleverly phrased signs such as, “Fair Contract – OVERDUE”, my grumpy, mean librarians seemed to be taking their grumpiness to the streets. I said to my daughter, “I seriously refuse to cross a picket line just to borrow books that will only cost me overdue fines in the end.”

So we didn’t go in. But as we drove away, I put down my window and put my finger up to my lips and yell-spered “SHHHHHH!!” at the librarians.

Okay, that last part was a lie. I’m too passive-aggressive to do that. But wouldn’t that have been funny? Oh, and “yell-sper?” that’s when you yell as loudly as you can without raising your voice above a whisper. Moms are pros at this, as in, “Get over here RIGHT NOW.” Or, just think of Jack Bauer in 24 – he yell-spers everything. 

I have to admit to a SAS (Short Attention Span) when it comes to coupons. To sit there and plan out meals, cut the coupons out, remember the coupons when you go shopping and focus on the coupons when you have little distractions children with you… it’s just too much. Then, every once in a while, I get all focused and spendthrift and decide there really is logic to using the “free” money stores are handing out. It was from a few other bloggers (like The Sparrow’s Nest) that I learned about CVS pharmacy’s cool Extra Care Bucks and decided to try it out. I clipped coupons, I looked at the deals they had in yesterday’s paper and made my list. We stopped by there last night on the way to my kids’ choir and got our deals.

I’m horrible at math, so this took me some time to figure out: If you have a CVS card, you get their sale prices on items, plus some items earn you Extra Care Bucks. For instance, this week if you spend $10 on Hershey’s Easter candies, you get $5 in ECBs. That means you have split your cost in half. Then you add the $1.50 off coupon and you have 7 bags of chocolatey joy for $3.50. Of course the ECB’s are printed on the bottom of your receipt – so they are getting you to come back in the future. So I piled up our items, using regular coupons as well to bring our savings way down. Here is most of my pile of stuff:

Isn’t that an exciting photo? Me, being new to the CVS way, watched as the clerk rang it up and it came to $5.67! All that for $5.67?? I was amazed! I was Coupon Woman! I was Mother of the Day! I was definitely bound for the blogroll of Women Who Don’t Spend Anything and Look Like It! (Sorry. Joke.)

I went to the car and checked the receipt looking for my ECBs for the Excedrin. Yes, it’s my thorn in the flesh to deal with a lot of headaches (no, none of them people you would know. Joke #2.) and Excedrin and I have been BFFs forever. So I was excited to see the deal of the week was that if you spent $20 on Excedrin products, you would get $10 back in ECBs (cutting the cost of the Excedrin to $10); plus I had two coupons for a total of $5 off of them, bringing my headache relief cost to $5 for two HUGE boxes of Excedrin that should last me through at least the first week of the Cubs’ season. The problem was that she hadn’t charged me for them. I wasn’t such a saver after all. Then there’s the momentary thought of the fact that I just got 350 Excedrin pills for free. But it was a momentary, fleeting thought (Old nature, natch.). I went back in and showed her that she hadn’t charged me for them (even though she had taken off the coupons!) and I ended up paying for them – but earned the ECBs then. Sorry, was that confusing?

However, in the grand, complicated scheme of coupons and ECBs and CVS and ATMs and ATVs and BFFs, it comes down to this: The manager came over to see what was up with me coming back in and told me he wouldn’t have come back. The clerk told me she wouldn’t have come back. But both thanked me about ten times for coming back. And when I figured it all out, I figure honesty cost me $5. But the feeling of self-righteousness? Priceless. (Ah! Can’t stop! Another joke. Sorry.)

All told, I spent $16 for my pile of loot. Who knows how long I’ll play this little game of coupons and spiritual conflict. But when I have that next migraine, I can know I paid for my right to pop those glorious Excedrin pills. I love you guys!! XOXO