The Ped Egg Experience

Recently I found myself out shopping with my sister. She was looking for new bedding for her room. So, we made the usual stops, TJMax's, Tuesday Morning, etc. She kept complaining, "let's just go to Dillard's". Dillard's! I exclaimed, "nobody goes to Dillard's for bedding". "They don't, she countered, why not"? "Well, Dillard's is just so middle of the road, trust me, you will pay a fortune and only get middle America". "And you my sissy, are not middle America, not while you are with me". "No... with me, you are scraping the bottom of the barrel America, so get used to it". While we were at Tuesday Morning we got yelled out. I was on my hands and knees digging for a second set of sheets to match the 620 thread count Italian blend sheets we'd finally settled on when I hear this bored, nasal voice coming from the register, "Please don't open the sheet packages". I looked up at my sister, now frozen in place, with her hand half way into a package, when she replied, "well how are we going to know if we like the sheets, if we can't feel them"? The cashier had by now put down the bag of Frito's she was working on and after wiping her hands on her sizable jeans she wiggled her fingers towards us, as if to say, "hand them over". "We can open them much better than you can, we do a better job and it will be..well better". In that split second, my sister pulled her hand out of the package she'd recently invaded and turned to me and said, "let's go, I am all done with Tuesday Morning". I slowly pulled myself up and looked at my sister and she had this look and right then I knew it was over for the Italian sheets- Chow baby! Off to the next stop, Bed Bath and Beyond your wildest imagination. There we not only found the sheets, pillows and euro inserts but, I also found the Ped-Egg. Who knew the ped egg doesn't take batteries? Not me. My sister told me, "Oooo, you have to have a ped-egg". I was thinking, for $10 bucks, nah. I'd rather spend my $10 bucks on two days of Chi Lattes at 4bucks, but she insisted. So now I have a ped-egg. The experience of using the ped egg is well, just so "manual". There are no batteries, you just shovel the egg back and forth- scraping your hoofs. It claims to be so gentle, it can't pop a balloon. Two seconds into my egg experience, I cut my finger. I should have bought the Sham-Wow.

Make new friends...

I am thinking about going to the gym... Whenever I post this on my FBook page, I will always get a few comments back from friends that wish me well, but know in their hearts, it ain't gonna happen! This morning I woke up and once the fog cleared, I thought I should go to the gym, I mean reallly go to the gym. But then I realized I had slept in my "gym" clothes, so what would I wear? Not that I don't have numerous pairs of black UCF t's and black sweats, I just happened to be wearing my favorite pair and I don't feel nearly as good in the others. Also, my favorite zippy was in the washer. I think that if the zippy had been available, I may have been able to go this morning, but it was just not gonna happen. I thought about that for a while and decided it might use up more energy washing what I was wearing, than it would to even go to the gym. I can actually picture myself walking into the gym, recognizing that smell, the noises. Yeah, I'd feel right at home on the elliptical, right next to that cute college co-ed and the lady that has asthma so bad, she really shouldn't be working out. I mean, I am totally sympathetic with her condition, but the grunting is so distracting to me. Here I am cussing like a sailor, internally of course. Thinking how the fbomb are you going to get through the next 20 minutes, blah, blah, blah and than there is this dawning recognition of someone grunting, like every 4 seconds... Sometimes when I am thinking about going to the gym, but instead go to Publix, I see the grunter- fast walking down the street, she is obviously walking to the gym. I have actually slowed my car down and opened my sunroof to see if I could hear the grunts. Bazaar, maybe. But I have this one sided relationship with her, "oh, there's my little grunter friend". She, for whatever reason does not acknowledge me. But I think of her as a friend, my grunting, gym friend. I have other friends that I see in Publix too, as that has become my big trip of the day now, when I am not thinking about going to the gym. Weird, if I think about going to Publix, I always seem to make it. It doesn't matter what I am wearing. My friends at Publix do not judge. Instead they welcome me in with the smell of freshly baked breads, sometimes, if you time it just right, you can sample a mini meal at their "Publix Apron" station. I was worried for a while that the economy may ruin this little treat, but so far, so good! For those of you that have jobs and can't make it to Publix while they are sampling, let me just say, it is better then the samples at Sam's. At Publix, they actually create a bite sized meal on a little plate and then they have all the ingredients right there for you to purchase- now tell me that is not a good friend! Yes, I'd have to say, in the friends department, unemployment has been good to me!

Hello Lover!

Cruise with me baby!

We were off to the Bahamas! Crap. Time for a bathing suit, the old one just wouldn't work in the Caribbean. Nah, the little elastic that was guaranteed to make you look 10 pounds thinner, just wasn't doing its' trick any longer. I guess there was an expiration date I'd missed in the fine print, Warning: the ten pound deal is only guaranteed for one year OR twenty pounds, which ever comes first. No comment. So, I get the new suit, it looks really cute over the new black cover-up. However, looking ten pounds thinner does have a price. Actually, it was an even toss-up with the price I paid for the suit and the cruise ticket. But we all know that looking ten pounds thinner is priceless, so back off! As I see it, the only problem with this whole, "look ten pounds thinner" deal is, ten pound is just not enough. I really needed the, "Oprah Winfrey special" the one that removes all body fat and changes your hair color. Ten pounds, I mean, really! I have found that you can actually look "ten pounds thinner" if you simply remove the Cheetos from your pockets!
So we leave for Port Canaveral and I look at my husband and I say, "you know how to get there, right"? He replies, "yes, I know how to get there". 1.5 hours later, I say to him, "that is really weird that it is taking us so long, because it is only an hour drive". Note to self, don't leave home without your GPS. We finally arrive at the Port and now we are getting happy. Which in itself it unusual for our family. We consistently are in a bad mood for the first 12 hours of any vacation we have ever taken together. Don't ask me why and I am sure we are completely unique in this, but we fight like cats and dogs just getting to where we are going. Could it be because we leave our house with our hair on fire and cell phones attached to our ears each time? For my husband, getting away from his business is nearly impossible.
And now, because of the unfortunate incident of my husband claiming to know where he was going and the hair fire...we are told when we drive into the port that we have 20 minutes to park and CARRY on our luggage, which is fine with me, as I don't want that bathing suit out of my sight! By the time we actually get to check in we are all breathing heavy. And because of the whole driving incident, I have now been self appointed as "lady in charge" and I carry all our documentation up to the counter. The lady checks in my son and daughter and takes my husband and my documents which by the way are birth certificates, not passports and she starts to shake her head..."this won't do at all", she says and she points at me, "this is a hospital certificate, not a real birth certificate and your husbands is the same, however, since he was born in a Navel hospital, he is OK". "You, on the other hand, cannot leave the country". OK, go easy, breath...things start to spin and I saw our boat leaving without us, "are you sure," I ask. I mean, not for nothing, but I have been living off that same birth certificate for a whole lotta, lotta and it has always worked before. "No Mame, the others may move forward and step up to the yellow line, but you may not, you have to go talk to Louise". Now I glance up at the clock and see that the ship really does depart in 15 minutes, and I am starting to really sweat. Not just the running with your luggage kinda sweat, but the, "you just lost a bunch of money and ruined the best chance you had of testing out that new elastic on your suit sort of sweat". Yeah, it was ugly. While I am being ushered over to Louise's line, (reads, "the loser's who didn't get their passport in time" line,) I hear the first lady trying to get my hubby and kids on the boat! My husband puts his foot down and declares, "if she can't go, no one goes". I turned to protest, but it was too late, I was already being pushed towards a big policeman and a lady, whom I assumed was Louise. I heard whispers from the other port workers, "psh...she has to talk to Louise". Louise takes one look at my documentation and she declares, "This is not a a real birth certificate, it is a hospital certificate and only proves you were born". I looked at her and inside my head that little bad voice that always gets me in deeper is saying,"really, because I am thinking that is WHAT I am trying to prove". But instead, I take a deep breath and say in the nice, I don't mean to be any trouble voice, "OK. now I am going to cry". She looked down her glasses at me and said, "honey, crying is not going to help your situation. Can't you call someone to fax you over your real birth certificate"? As I think about this genius suggestion, my mind working fast and furious, wondering who could I call and what does my house look like? I remembered that we left it in a bit of a mess getting out and in that split second, I weighed going on the cruise versus someone seeing the likely orange juice carton left out next to the cracked eggs we left behind. "OK, I will try to call someone", I blurted. Well, as my luck was running- that angle didn't pan out. But by this time I realize that the cop was hanging up the phone and he turned to Louise and said that it was all up to her. Louise, who by the way, looked like someones adorable little grandmother with twinkling blue eyes, leaned over real close to my hair and breathed hotly in my ear, she said, "I am going to let this happen and if you ever breath a word of this to anyone, I will hunt you down and nothing, and I mean nothing will stop me from making this the last cruise you ever take". "Have I made myself clear"? Stunned, I reached up and gave her a huge hug, which she did not appreciate one little bit and said, "Louise, I love you"! So, in the end, we made it on the boat. The cruise was too much fun and the bathing suit, well the elastic trick worked pretty well, up until I had that last Pina Colada, and then, not so much!

Loving and Losing

They say that bad things,happen in three's. I'm not sure of the accuracy of this, but have been left to wonder lately.
So in telling this story, I will have to admit to the fact that I am maybe a bit of a lurk on facebook...
Of course, I am only lurking friends that have by the mere virtue of having granted me "friend" status allowed this to happen. But still, I feel a little "over exposed" telling you in black and white, that really, I am a bit of a voyeur. So, all you "friends" out there, be on your guard. Now, back to the bad things happening in three's... Does it count if the three bad things are totally unrelated? What I mean is that in the recent week, I have seen on two of my "friends" facebook pages that they'd recently lost someone. In both cases it seemed to be a relatively young person and certainly someone that was well loved and would be tremendously missed. As I read some of the stories written about these individuals and as I was drawn into their lives, reveling in the stories of fun, mischief, love and loss, I felt a little uncomfortable leaning so far into this stranger's life. But in reading about each loss, I felt like I too would have been friends with this person and felt a certain loss in knowing that wasn't possible. But what I really recognized in each loss was that the person that had left this earth was loved by so many. In some cases it was by school mates that they had not spoken to in 20 years and in others', people would say, "I just ran into to him last week, I wish I had taken more time". Often you will hear people say that there is a silver lining in everything and that this is especially true in times of loss. Or, how about, "everything happens for a reason". During the time of loss, it is difficult to correlate the actual loss to a silver lining and certainly hard to understand the "reason" we have lost someone we love. Late this afternoon I received a call that someone who is very dear to me tragically lost a parent. There was no silver lining, no reason, it just happened. Earlier this week the losses I read about happened to somebody else and while I felt the pain in each writers post, it was nothing compared to the sadness I feel for my friend. And while I didn't know my friends' parent well, I, too, have been locked in the agony of loss and understand all too well the cloak of darkness it brings. Tonight I will say my prayers and my list of intentions will be a little longer.

No Soup for you!

Having recently achieved the status of a "stay at home mom", I have really tried to start to do the things that "other women", reads, (did not leave their families to fend for themselves for 15 years, while they went out to knock the corporate world dead and earn heaps of money, of which they currently have none) do when faced with 8-10 hours of the day, all alone. I still feel a little creepy in my house-alone during the day. When someone comes to the door, I immediately assume it is the pre-cursor to a home invasion...
So, back to the whole Betty Crocker thing, first off I want to say, I am certain that Betty Crocker was a fictional character, I know this because there is just no way you have time to clean the house, do the laundry AND bake a cake, just when would you have the time- in between all the fabulous re-runs of The Real House Wife's on Bravo?
But I have never been one to rest on my laurels, so try I do... Yesterday I decided to make cauliflower soup. Ask why, and I'd tell you that is an excellent question, but when my cousin sent me the recipe and she said it only looked complicated, but was really easy, I thought, "I'll do it", my first mistake!
Fast forward to me having been in the kitchen for like already way too long and it is time to put the multiple ingredients that have now been chopped, diced, blanched, sauteed and just about anything else you can do to veggies and still call them nutritional into the food processor. Now I have had this food processor for about 10 years and my kids walk in and say, "Wow, Mom, where did that come from"? I'm a little annoyed, but I reply, "It's a food processor you under exposed children, it will take all this crap and puree it for soup". My son added, "you mean so that our dinner is mush"? "Yeah, son, YOUR dinner will be mush" I responded. I proceeded to pour the stuff into the food processor, and I have to say, it was a mess. When I pushed the pulse button, liquid flew up out of the mixer all over the counter and floor, which was already wet and sticky from the club soda that had exploded when I opened it earlier,(another story). My son said, "Umm Mom, I don't think that is how it is supposed to work". I looked up at him over my glasses that had now slipped down my nose and said, " liked you'd know and what are you doing here, aren't you supposed to be renewing your driver's license, so that they don't haul you away"? By now, I am totally regretting this endeavor and Chinese food take out is sounding really good. My daughter, deciding it is time to rescue me comes over and says to me, "there shouldn't be a hole in the center of the food processor, everything is escaping out". I looked at her and attempting a kind tone say, "it is just like a bunt cake honey, they have holes", "Yeah, she replied, I know, but there still shouldn't be a hole in the center and the food isn't even getting mashed up". And another thing, she added, "why is this thing", she pointed to the blade laying on the counter, "not INSIDE of the processor"? I looked down at the counter top and saw the blade-thingy laying there and looked around my kitchen, where I had every stock pot I owned out (3) along with two mixing bowls and numerous other cooking apparatus' and thought, "why do I try so hard"? I moved across the kitchen, my feet making sticking noises on the tile and recovered the blade and calmly poured the mess inside the mixer into yet another large bowl and placed the blade in the processor and thought to myself, there must be something "bad wrong" with me not to have realized the hole wasn't natural- it just wasn't designed to work that way. Now, I will admit that when I first started to pour the ingredients into the food processor, I thought, this is so weird because you have to be really careful to not allow the food to get into the middle hole and I thought to myself, "what faulty design"! So, in the end, we had our cauliflower soup for dinner and it was pretty good, although my son sat there with his bowl and passing his spoon through the soup, asked me, "is there any meat in this stuff"?

dogs are people too...

When I shop at Whole Foods, a couple of things happen; first, I spend way more money than I should, but when I am in there, I also start thinking about what it would be like to "live" like a real typical Whole Foods shopper lives. I figure one of the first things I'd have to do would be stop asking for plastic. Everyone there seems to bring in their own bags and that is cool, I even have a couple of those "recycle" bags, but they are filled with my dry cleaning. Also, Whole Food shoppers definitely seem a lot cooler than I am, so I will have to work on getting a more hip look, oh, I don't know maybe lose the Chanel's and switch to RayBan's? Something else that hits me in Whole Food are the "self help" isles- it is like being in echineacha heaven- something to cure almost anything. So that leads me to admitting that while I am there, I start to think about colon cleansing, monster vitamins, natural sleep aides, well, you get the picture. Well, one fine day while browsing the isles, I stumbled onto the “Pure Omega fish Oils”. They had about 27 different types to pick from, each one promising one benefit after another, who could resist? I was certain that in addition to having shiny hair, I'd also get the benefits of age reversal, increased memory, healthy heart, hell, I may even start yoga! And since I had already put a gallon container of Protein Whey smoothie mix in my cart, I figured, why not make that smoothie extra healthy with some pure omega oil? Once I got home I proceeded over the next two weeks to drink one of those “special” smoothies every morning. I actually thought my hair did look shinier, in fact, I was so impressed, I started making the smoothies for the entire family. We ran out of the omega oil, so I ran back to Whole Foods and re-upped. This smoothie thing was really taking off in my house! I was on the phone one morning and trying to make my smoothie at the same time and I was telling my friend about the oil I added as my special ingredient, she asked me how much I put in and I said, “I really don’t measure, I just pour some in”, but that made me actually look at the label to see if I was- gasp, over pouring. Reading the label I felt my eyes start to blur, it didn't make sense, it read, “The Omega-3 fatty acids EPA and DHA in this product provide powerful natural nutrition that supports the overall health of your pet. My pet? I barked (could not resist) and almost gagged.. I was halfway through my second bottle of what I now considered dog food!!
I seriously contemplated tossing not only the balance of the bottle (I did of course) but also my last three weeks of breakfast smoothies, right then and there!
Moral of the story...When at Whole Food, beware..the pet supplies are sometimes housed right next to the people items and if you are not careful you may end up with a bark that is worse than your bite!