Which is Practically Scientific Research

We went to Park City with an amazing couple friend of ours, Brad and Nicole, or Bricole for future reference. The weather was amazing, the skiing was awesome, and I only had 2-3 emotional breakdowns about missing G to the izzo. Note to mom's: if you're on vacation 800 miles from your 17 month old, do not, I repeat do not try to talk to him on the phone. Disastrous. There I am, balling in the bathroom at the bottom of the ski lift as women stop to stare at the mumbling marshmallow sobbing into her cell phone. But needless to say, he was perfectly fine without us, or so we hear from the grandmom's (Who incidentally probably wouldn't tell us if he was a basketcase because they knew we would have been on the first plane back if they told us he so much as sneezed. And since it behooved them to have us gone, so they could hog him to themselves, they refrained from mentioning anything like that. Thank you, Grandmommies).

So there we are, our first night in Park City and after a 5am flight, an hour bus ride, and 4 hours of skiing, we all decide to hit the local grocery store for some provisions and also food etc. I'm cruising the cereal isle, almost comatose from exhaustion when Nicole runs over to tell me, "I think Katherine Heigl is here!"

To prove how out if it I was, I go, "The girl in Grant's class who runs the marathons? Who gives a flying rats a**, she's too skinny anyway". (Again, I was barely conscious and that is why my initial reaction was not to run up and down the isles screaming, "K-K! It's me! Your long lost, BFF! Do you want to come to my house to play?")

Nicole stares at me for a second and takes off to get another item on our list. As I near the milk and eggs isle I glance to my left and OH MY GOD, THERE'S KATHERINE HEIGL. Wait for it... Ohhhhhhhhh, Katherine Heigl, now I get it. (Brain attempting to connect neurons now.)

And friends, let me make your day. She. Doesn't. Really. Look. Like. That. Now, let me go off for a second here and I'll be back to where we started in a second. The thing, or one of the many many things about show business that pisses me off is that women are portrayed and expected to look unbelievably gorgeous at all times which is a feat not even Jesus could pull off, so that's one thing. Jesus doesn't want us to kill ourselves and airbrush virtual people out of thin air so that small children can grow up thinking the world is made up of 10 foot Barbie and Ken dolls. In fact, I believe there may be some underground footage of satan himself creating Barbie and Ken, but it's strictly on the DL so I can't show you.

Getting back to Katherine, I think she's unbelievably cute, I sincerely do. But - she has flaws, and zits, and greasy hair too. And I only stared at her for about 5 minutes, but I'm pretty sure nothing she was wearing was name brand or even new for that matter. As if I needed any more reason to stalk her, now I really want to because she's normal! Or so my assessment was after 5 minutes of staring...

Remind Me To Tell You the One About "Cheese!"

Boy oh geez it's been a while. Insert several apologetic comments here... And on to the news!

Let's take stock, shall we?

3 weeks in Ohio for Christmas vacation - Check.

1 week stint in Park City having a marvelous time skiing - Check.

2 cases of near-death gastrointestinal virus, not marvelous - Yep, check.

1 Katherine Heigl siting - Check.

423 new toddler toys I don't have anywhere to put - Check.

7 days of delaying taking down Christmas decorations - Check.

200 new words in Griffin's vocabulary - Check, check, check, CHEESE!

22 days past rent due date - Whoops and check. (Well, actually there's no check, that's the problem. See, my checkbook was among the casualties in trying to pack up way-too-much-f'ing-crap in about 15 minutes to come back to New York after my near-death viral experience last weekend. RIP checkbook, sorry Landlord.)

And most importantly, at least 37 good stories I have to tell you, just as soon as I get around to it. (Read: So if you're lucky before next Christmas...)

Ciao!

USS New York

While driving into the city Saturday night, Grant and I drove right past the USS New York docked at pier 88. I must say that I had no idea this ship existed nor that it was forged from steel from the World Trade Center debris. But after G filled me in on it, I set about trying to find out as much as possible about it, and Wednesday we'll be taking Griffin to see it in person.

I just find it deeply moving that the people who are responsible for it coming about had the foresight and determination to see this symbol of our nation's unity come to fruition. I think I am also still saddened by the Fort Hood tragedy, but seeing this ship has sent my emotions into overload, once again. I have such mixed feelings about the wars and our government, I'm truly torn when thinking about the future of our armed forces.

I guess I have this maternal feeling of responsibility to all of the men and women who protect our safety both here and abroad including the police, firefighters, marines, army, navy, coast guard, and anyone else I'm forgetting. Though I would cringe at the suggestion that Griffin someday enter into one of these incredible fields, I realize he may feel the need to serve his country this way and so I hope I would be able to support it. Because all of these people are somebody's son and somebody's daughter, let alone husband, wife, father, mother etc.

It makes me want to do small things for these people if and when I can. I try to buy police officer's coffee if I see them in line behind me at the bodega. And I keep procrastinating but will eventually bake something to take to my neighborhood firehouse too. I want to take Grif to see the ship so that one day we can talk about 9/11 and hopefully he'll feel some of these same emotions too. So, I guess I just wanted to share the story of this ship with you to get you thinking.

Probably Not Going to Make "Most Popular" with This One...

Alright, I admit it, I'm a card carrying member of a "Mom's Group". I'm not proud of it, but at this point, it's either talk crochet and crockpots or completely lose my mind. Now where's my damn knitting needle?

So to carry my weight in the Mom's Group I've posted several memo's on our google page from time to time. The last post being yesterday and involving the first mention in 2 months of a night out for the mom's to leave the kids behind with dad and finally get to know each other a little more than, "Sara! Get that light plug out of your mouth!" or "I've changed 15 poopy diapers today!" Do you see the problem here?

Cut to this morning when I eagerly log in to check all of the hits I've gotten on my Night Out invite and do you want to know what I saw?

(MNO) Mom's Night Out
By Teresa B* - Nov 5 - 1 author - 0 replies

W.O.W. Not only do I have no prospects for sanity here, I'm now the "Bad Mom" because clearly I "don't care" about my kid and his infinite poopy diapers and lego stacking abilities. I'm sure the group owner is scouring her google capabilities to see how fast she can un-join me from the group. But I've got news for you, Crazy Mom Group Ladies, I hate crochet! In fact. I've had the same scarf in progress for 3 YEARS, and I'm damn proud of it. So shove that in your crockpot and slow-cook it.

And Now You Know Why My Cable Guy is on Speeddial

Big plans for the weekend, huge (compared to my normal plans verging on minute). Griffin's going to carve his first pumpkin. Well actually, I'm going to carve it and then after covering him head to toe with dropcloths, give him all of the pumpkin innards to play with. After which I will photograph him and show you later, because that's what parents do. They humiliate their offspring and publicize it for laughs. And in response, said offspring spend their entire lives trying to even the score. Now you never need to watch another Dr. Phil episode again. Didn't think you'd reap such an amazing benefit from reading my stuff, now did you? Consider yourself gifted with the majesty of avoiding Dr. Douchbag.

In related news, you know how most of my friends are tv personalities? Yeah, you too? Good, I love when we find things in common. We'd kill on eHarmony Olympics. Anyway, I've talked before about Op's and Ellen, but recently I have a major crush on the entire cast of 30 Rock. Like insane group crush. Not your usual Jim and Pam - 2 person crush, nope the whole shebang. It's not that I want to be on the show as a castmember, I just want their characters to be real life people that I work with. Then I for sure wouldn't be falling asleep at my desk every half hour... What? Did I say that? Ha.

What did people do before sitcoms? Horror.

Yep, I Did That.

To save you the trouble of googling this before you send an email to the entire department that confirms the suspicions that you're a flaming idiot.

Moot Vs. Mute.

Anything I can do to help my fellow 'Intellectually Challenged' persons.

In other news, on my way to work this morning a man walking his 5 year old daughter to school gave me the once over and proclaimed, "God Bless You". And hereafter my list:
1. Shut up, you're walking your daughter to school.
2. What the hell does that even mean anyway? Do I need blessed today?
3. I reiterate: You, with a 5 year old (though she is insanely cute with her pink backpack) = not hot.
4. I do confess that the blessing was much classier than the whistle, the profanity, or the gesturing but still - 5 year old. Gross.

I Get It! Frigid-Air! Silly GE.

Temperature Alert: It is f-ing FREEZING here. When did that happen? Where have I been that I didn't notice it until my fingers were so stiff I could no longer type or pull my pants up after visiting the you-know-where? I mean don't get me wrong, I love October. But we could use a little easing into winter instead of this frat party bingefest of frigid air and freezing rain. Like give me an orientation week or two, at least.

Hold on, my Pandora's way too loud.

There, much better for think/writing. Plus, I just noticed the people in the hallway are headbanging to my Beyonce and that is so not cool. My Beyonce. Mine.

Can you tell I have a 14 month old? No? Yes? No? (Welcome to Parenthood. Now you get why Mommy needs her cocktail.)

My little buddy is getting so big these days. In true genetic brilliance he said his first sentence the other day. "Dada byebye". And he even knew how to use punctuation after quotation marks correctly. Sheer genius. He also picked up an acorn at the playground, (because out of all the amazing and fun looking pieces of equipment he could possibly play with he chooses small choke hazards - why do I feel karma is associated with this reality?) and held it up in one hand while using his other hand to sign "eat" to me with a question mark in his eyebrows. PEOPLE. Maybe you don't understand that this translates into English as "Hello, I will be the next leader of the free world", but that is exactly what it does. Just saying.

It IsTime For Change

Seeing as how it's Fall, I've made an executive decision that it is New Leaf Day in our household. There has got to be a way to squeeze more productivity from my day, and by God, I'm going to find out how. Starting with writing, I have got to get my act together and write more. I think some of this problem stems from the fact that when I'm crazy busy I feel like I don't have the time to write something great. And if I can't create something quasi-intelligible, I don't want to even bother with the time.

So more on this later, the babe is a-stirring, but what would you do on New Leaf Day?

*Brainstorm #3* They Also Drink Out of the Toilet

Does anyone else find it offensive that dog food commercials now very closely resemble TGI Friday's commercials? Maybe it's just me but the day I buy Chef Michael's Canine Creations for our dog is the day I iron my dinner napkins (or in other words, never). Plus, they try to sell the food because it looks like table food when in reality it looks like chunky dog food covered in gravy.

Attention Chef Michael advertising committee: the people of America do not think your commercial is appetizing. Because *Brainstorm #1* we can tell the difference between real food and dog food. What was that team meeting like: I know! Let's appeal to the people who think regular dog food does not look appetizing enough for their dogs! *Brainstorm #2* let me put this delicately: dogs lick their own butts. Are you really concerned they may not find dry dog food appetizing?

I have a better idea, can you do anything for Olive Garden? They need you now more than ever.

Note to Self: Dye Hair Before 15-Year

Why haven't I told you about my 10 year high school reunion yet? Why? Why? Why? Because I don't care if you have never met anyone from my high school at all, this is an entertaining story.

I'll skip over the part where I was either gigantically popular or enormously stupid which led me to be our senior class president, but I was. Which leaves me forever strapped to the responsibility of planning our reunions, and thereby receiving months and months of hate-mail emails telling me what a horrible job I'm doing, and how the reunion is going to suck, and how my eyebrows are uneven. *Highlight.* And maybe some would even say I deserve the hate email because I don't "plan things in advance" or "give a shit", but I say to those people, "f%$^ off" and if you would rather snort spaghetti through your nose than come to a reunion planned by me, than go for it Chef Boyardee. L'chaim.

My idea for our reunion involved two things: people and booze. Now, maybe I'm a little conceited here but I didn't estimate it taking me very long to secure these things for the party, like, all of 4.7 seconds of my time. Which must have just really pissed some people off. Wait I retract, there was a good 15 minutes it took me to stop and pick up sticky name tags, 15 minutes 4.7 seconds total. Added to some serious Facebook and emailing efforts to reach people and we were in the money.

Day of reunion arrives and Grant and I get there early, but not early enough because there was already 4 or 5 people waiting. Wow, the enthusiasm. I measure the evening on several points that added up to an all out raging success. The points are as follows:

- Out of 210ish classmates, around 80 were in attendance.

- A total of 4 people were cut off at the bar before 9pm.

- The cops were called 3 times.

- My tab was under $100.

If not for some minor fall backs (ie the bartender recognized me immediately as the "older sister" of one of her friends and ps she graduated high school in 2005), I was thrilled to have so many people there and watch everyone having a great time together. Especially, the part where our former classmate cornered Grant by the bar to give him this card before launching into a 15 minute narrative about his trip to the Netherlands for the Redhead Convention. Let that just sink in for a minute. Poor guy spent the entire party trying to locate every person in our class who had red hair to initiate them into the club. And by the way, you have to have a passcode to get into the website. Those redheads don't joke around. But by far, my favorite comment of the night was his and his alone, "Hey Mike, does your sister still have red hair?".

A-may-zing.