Cereal

We have a lot of cereal. Mostly because cereal is the main food group for my 7 year old. Since the age of 6 months and the discovery of Cheerios she has not once ever looked back. The child loves cereal. On average, my child eats cereal 3 times a day, no lie. Ask her what she wants for dinner and invariably the answer is, "hmmm, uhmmmm, OH, CEREAL!".

At the moment, however, the bulk of my cereal supply is not of the Cheerio-Rice Krispie variety. It is of Special K - see we parental units are trying to stick around a few years to see these kids off to college. This longevity requires that we stop eating bacon morningnoonandnight. :( Therefore, we have invested a small fortune in Special K of every variety, except bacon, because they don't make Special K with Bacon Bits. I also found Special K of every variety on BOGO. For those of you who are not Piggly Wiggly savvy that is Buy One Get One - FREE! And what could be better than free cereal? Maybe free bacon......

So we have all this cereal and my wonderful significant other, who likes to complain, but who is SUPPOSED TO BE on a complaining vacation feels that the Red Berries are hard. And instead of just thinking it in your head and then eating, say Cinnamon Pecan next time, he MUST voice how stupid it is to add hard fruit to a bowl of cereal. I mean really, if it isn't going to soften up, why bother???? Stupid Cereal CEO's and your evil plot to destroy teeth! I'd like to point out to him that the Red Berries do, in fact, get very soft in the cereal if you give the milk, oh say, 20 seconds to do it's thing. But apparently the man inhales the cereal before said berries have any opportunity to soak up some fun.

This complaining man, who is SUPPOSED TO BE not complaining, also thinks that the Yogurt and Fruit variety sucks. And, shockingly, has announced to the world (being me) that the Yogurt and Fruit variety is basically dog shit and should be banned from earth, yanno, instead of just dumping it and going for, oh say, one of the other 14 boxes. Ahem.

I can tell you that I LOVE the Yogurt and Fruit variety of Special K - I find it YUMMY with both hard yogurt bits and soft fruit pieces. I also LOVE the Red Berries, which I find get all soft and sweet and make the milk all pinky like (and who can't appreciate pinkness?). And now, my friends, I am hungry. I shall get away from this god forsaken machine to go enjoy a bowl of fruity, yogurty goodness....and a piece or 4 of bacon. Do think it will cancel out?

Skinny

It's time for school shopping around here. I remember how much I loved to get all my new back to school items when I was younger. Fresh new pencils, a brand new Trapper Keeper, the very cutest notebooks with kittens on them, the Smurf lunchbox, ahhhhhh. And don't even get me started on the smell of new clothing. I LOVED August. My kids, however, would rather send me out to get it all while they stay home to play. Sigh. My kids don't mind shopping so much, but they really don't have that many opinions on what they wear or which store it comes from - whew! - which makes my life much more affordable. Even my 11 year old, going to Middle School for the first time, said I could just go get her some cute stuff from Target - Hallelujah!! She is not picky at all. She also has no mind to match anything correctly, but that my friends is another post in itself.....

During our mall outing with friends yesterday, my oldest saw a cute shirt at Gap. It said "Little Miss Chatterbox", which I must agree, fits her to personality to a "T"! It was cute and I agreed to purchase it for her, seeing as how I picked out the rest of her school wardrobe. "It looks a bit, uhhhm, well, why don't you go try it on first?". And she happily skipped off to the fitting room with a size 12 shirt. A few minutes later she came back, without the shirt on. "It doesn't fit, not at all." Ok, I sent her back with a 16, because after I took a good look at the shirt I knew what was about to happen.

You see the picture of the shirt outline and then the shape of my child. This is not going to work, especially because the shirt is made of super thin, very taut cotton which is made to conform and hug the body. Even going up by 2 sizes, the shirt fits like a sausage stuffed into pantyhose. Or something, you can get your own visual. And at 2 sizes up we are at the largest shirt in the store and at a dead end.

What hurts me the most is that almost every store we go to, the pre-teen girl section is blanketed with shirts in just this shape - hourglass. This limits our selections greatly and it causes my daughter to say, "Oh, that shirt is for skinny girls" or "I'm too chubby for that." The last time I checked, most 11 year olds are pre-puberty meaning they are not shaped like an hour-glass. Hell, I'm almost menopausal and I've never been shaped like an hour-glass. My kid is on the far end of medium, a bit of a chubette, but she is not a plus sized gal. She is a pre-teen, encased in baby fat who will likely emerge into a medium sized build.

On the other end of the spectrum are the "skinny girls" who can wear these shirts. There are plenty of them, the girls who have started to take shape and don't have any chub to hide things that are beginning to pop out. I have a neice with this shape and I can tell you that she does NOT want to wear anything that will hug and conform to her body either.

It is just wrong, that my child is being made to believe that she is abnormal because people in the fashion industry design mainstream clothing with the intent to show off a body. These are little girls, trying to figure out what the hell is happening to them. They certainly don't need to worry about clothing that causes them to feel bad about themselves, or worse yet, to draw attention to the things that are freaking them out.

I can see the long road that my daughter has ahead of her in learning to accept her body. I can only guide her and hope for the best, but in this society I'm certain that she and many other girls of all shape and size, will have many more hurdles than victories in self acceptance.

Backwards

My kids have been fighting over a typewriter for the past few days. It all started at an Antique Mall. My oldest found an ancient typewriter and thought it was so cool. I told her I had a typewriter, but I had given it to my grandmother. While Granny loves to type letters and such, she can't (or won't) grasp real technology and let me set her up with a PC. So she types.

Immediately upon leaving the Antique Mall my oldest is on the phone calling my Granny, about 5 hours later a typewriter (my old one from high school) is delivered to our front door. Squeals of delight emit and my oldest retreats to her room and locks us all out. All we hear is clicking for the next few hours......

When my child emerges with many, many pages of typed nothingness she proclaims, "THIS IS SOOOO COOOL!" And pronounces that any and all future letters, school work, etc. will be typed. I find this mildly amusing since we have 4 computers in our home, 2 on each floor, and in reality we mostly have 5 if you count hubby's work laptop. All of said PC's are wirelessly connected to our printer. This child has had countless opportunities to type her work over the years. This child is very well versed on using the PC and Microsoft Word, and yet an ancient typewriter is still "SOOOOO COOOOOL". This makes me want to vomit.

I explained to my child that typewriters are really backwards, considering all the technology that we have with word processors and the like. I told her all the reasons, but more importantly the lack of being able to correct your mistakes. She does not buy it, clearly I am stupid and she will be so careful that no mistakes will be made. Ha!

An hour later she runs into my room. "I was typing a story and I had NO mistakes and I was doing so good and then I left out a WHOLE paragraph! Can you fix it, Mom?" Oh, sweet justice, how stupid am I now?

I believe that my child has a new appreciation for the PC - at least I hope she does. It does strike me as funny, though, that she could have very well gone her entire lifetime not truly understanding how far we have come. She did not even know what a typewriter was before this incident.

In other news, I did some serious cooking yesterday. Face it, I'm southern and grief or sadness means I must feed someone. I spent yesterday morning cooking for my Grandmother so that while they are trying to digest the news of cancer they will have one less worry. I made 8 meals in one run.....

Pot Roast with mashed potatoes & gravy
Grilled Chicken with green beans
Taco Kit
Quesadilla Kit
2 Chicken Casseroles
Supreme Pizza
Baked Ravioli
Banana Pudding
Also - cornbread and biscuits to go with everything

So, if anyone is tired of cooking, just find a true southern woman and let her know you are suffering. Hot cornbread will surely be on your doorstep soon. I'm southern and I feed people.

Babe

I can't write what I feel today. I just don't have the words and I'm just not a writer. I wish I could spill it all out and that it would all makes sense, but I type and erase and realize that I just don't have it in me. Nothing comes out how it feels and words just can't describe it.

I call him "Babe" and he calls me "Babe". I don't know why, it just works. My grandfather has always been one of my friends. Today, my friend has a rare cancer and I have no words for it. The only word I have is hope, I hope that there is more time. He has had a long and plentiful life, but I'm just not finished with him yet.

Skeptic

Have you ever had a friend that you really wanted to tell her something, but just knew that you couldn't?

I do.

I have a long time, great friend and I love her dearly. I can not stand her man and I can not tell her. This is killing me. They have been together for a few years and try as I might, I can't stand the guy. This doesn't keep us apart, but it makes it hard to want to do all the fun things like go out, go away or just stay in. But I can not tell her. See, there is nothing about this guy that makes me believe that he is mistreating her or cheating on her, etc. It is not that I get an immoral vibe, but that I just really think he is completely full of shit. I can not remember having one, not even one, conversation with this person where I felt like he was being honest and genuine. Not EVER.

When I talk to my friend we always talk about our guys and what they are up to, etc. and the things that she tells me that are going on in their lives are so unbelievably off the wall, I can't believe that she buys his crap. He is a first rate egomaniac and thinks that he is God's gift to the world - and he loves to talk about how much everyone just loves him and how he is the absolute best at, well, EVERYTHING. It is just really too much. The stories he tells are so incredibly outlandish that I can't see how anyone buys it. Perhaps my friend wants to focus on the positive and give him the benefit of the doubt, but I am amazed that she is blind to the steaming manure. If I were to believe even 1/4 of his stories, this man has been offered countless jobs with salaries higher than anyone I know, yet there is always a reason that the job is just not for him.

I suppose I am just a skeptic. I get it honest, though. My grandmother on the not so inbred side of my family doesn't trust anyone.ever.noway. She honestly thinks that everyone on earth is out to rip her off. This is a great trait to have since so many elderly people are preyed on, but she is downright nasty to folks. She doesn't trust the bank and I'd venture to say that if her house burned down so would all her money. She handed this skepticism down to my father and he has always told us to "do the research" on everything. He is pretty leary to most salespeople and 'new' fangled ideas. I get my loathing of salespeople from him. While I have finally met some salespeople on the up, I still have my doubts about a lot of them. I do think I read people pretty well, and if I get a weird vibe from someone at first meeting it is really hard for me to ever get past it.

So, back to my point, I got a weird vibe the first time I met my friend's man. I've questioned her on a lot of things, but never have come right out to say I just don't like him. They are married and it won't change anything if I do say it, other than to harm our friendship. So I suppose I should just deal with it.

Inbred

I've known my whole life that my grandparents were cousins.

Yes, I said it outloud(?), my grandparents were related to one another before getting married. (insert GASP). Now everyone can proceed to determine that YES I live Georgia, the south, the capitol of backwards southerness and inbreeding. If you are a stero-typing butthead, yes, that is true. Fortunately for me, I never truly knew the entire background of this related-ness until now. NOW, I know that I am actually more inbred that I ever thought. My grandparents are 3rd cousins! Here's a little snippet of my family tree (names have been changed to protect the not so innocent).

Yes, my family tree branches out and then reconnects. Clearly this is not normal. Clearly this is a bit weird. Clearly this is disturbing. Joseph and Samantha are brother and sister, farther down the line Joseph's grandaughter WENDY marries Samantha's grandson GEORGE. Well, folks, Wendy & George are MY grandparents.

The funniest part is that I believe that my ancestors were so completely whack that the whole process of crossing the branches, so to speak, may have actually straightened some things out. In the history of my grandparents, their siblings, their children and children's children and so on.....well, I think we are by far the most blessed. There is a terrible history of bi-polar and thyroid disease going down the line, horrible arthritis that attacks very young, fertility issues, heart disease, severe asthma and cancer. Thankfully my immediate family has been able to dodge a lot of bullets healthwise, KNOCK ON WOOD. Personality issues, I think my family is pretty lucky as well - I've seen some real nut jobs at extended family reunions.

Besides this inbreeding, I think it is really cool that I am able to trace my family back to 1766. This is all thanks to my great uncle who did all of the research before dementia took him away from us, mentally. If I had just ONE more generation back I would be able to see if I was a Daughter of the American Revolution. I think it would be really cool to know what heroic things my great, great, great, great, great grandfather did to help shape our history. SOMEDAY, when I have some time, I hope to dive a little deeper. For now, just please don't judge me and pray that my grandchildren don't have arms growing out of their ears........

Headache

Not tonite, honey, I have a headache......

This has been more often than not lately. I get headaches fairly regularly. I can usually tell when I'm going to get one, but as much as I do to try to ward it off, it always comes. Recently, I've been getting more frequent headaches at times when I would not normally get one. These headaches are not as intense as the migraines, but annoying none the less. I really should probably get checked out.........

I sent my husband to bed in a huff because I had a headache and he was getting no love from me. I THOUGHT the testosterone was running smoothly since he spent a few hours blowing up people on the Playstation. Apparently I was wrong.

The next morning I wake up and reach to push my hair behind my ears. I feel something crusty in my hair, but I dismiss it to the fact that I have kids and somebody probably put their grimy hands in my hair while giving goodnight kisses. No problem, I'm taking a shower anyway. In the mirror I notice my face has white crust from the corner of my mouth to my ear and then again up on my forehead. Did I drool myself into a puddle? No, I don't really do that. Now I'm just MAD.

I walked into the bedroom, "so what, now I'm a TOOL to use while I'm sleeping? You are a freak show! Who does this to their sleeping wife!? Are you KIDDING ME???", I'm screaming to a very confused looking husband. I will tolerate a lot of weird stuff, but don't mess with me while I am asleep. Have the courtesty to wake me up and then use me for your own satisfaction..... My blood was boiling, "and YOU are washing the sheets you pervert!".

My husband gave me a moment to collect myself, I went and washed my face. I also realized that some of the crust on my face was greenish.....WTF? I know this is not like "snot green" and I start to recall the events of the night. Husband, blasting away on Playstation and me with a headache. My typical headache routine is to take multitudes of Excedrin and put ice on my head. My pervert husband had purchased me a gel eyemask to keep in the freezer for such headaches - they usually concentrate around my eye area. I used that eyemask for this particular headache. That eyemask that is filled with GREEN gel. That eyemask that is supposed to be refridgerated, not FROZEN. That eyemask that is LEAKING GREEN GEL which drys into a nice crust. Ok, so he's not a using me for a tool while I'm asleep, I guess I will stop calling him a pervert - for today.