Are You Cool Enough For Michael Jeffries?

If you’re involved in any kind of social media, chances are you’ve read about the statement made by the CEO of Abercrombie & Fitch, Michael Jeffries.  If not, I don’t want to be the only one who’s holding a torch and pitchfork, so take a look at this….

What a multi-million dollar douchebag.

When I first read about this, I was offended on so many levels:  as a curvy woman whose left boob probably wouldn’t fit into an Abercrombie & Fitch’s size L t-shirt; as a parent who is trying like hell to raise kids who are accepting, kind, and respectful of others; and as a decent human being who doesn’t like it when someone acts like an asshole – especially when that asshole is marketing to kids.

When I brought this up with my 14-year old daughter and decisively told her that we would never buy another piece of Abercrombie & Fitch clothing, she got angry…. which in turn made me angry.  I wanted her to join in the fight and be as outraged as I was about this man’s prejudicial opinions, but she wasn’t.  After a few minutes of bickering back and forth, it was clear that neither one of us wanted to budge.  So, we left the subject lying on the ground like a hot coal we didn’t know how to extinguish.  She stormed off to school and my head erupted like Krakatoa.

Michael Jeffries can kiss my XL SIZED ASS!!!!

Once I simmered down, I thought about our conversation. In hindsight, I probably should have waited to talk about this when I could approach it logically rather than emotionally.  Although, given the fact that this subject is a bit of a hot button for me, I might’ve had to wait until she was collecting social security before I could’ve talked about it logically.

But I should have at least told her what I read and then asked her opinion on the subject, rather than acting like the parent Nazi.  Because once you tell a teenager they can’t do something, it becomes irresistible.  Even if you pick something they wouldn’t normally have done – like telling them that they’re never allowed to inject puppies with heroin…. you’d better believe some puppies will be tripping before bedtime.

I think my daughter saw not being allowed to wear Abercrombie & Fitch as the social status stock market crash of 2013.  Kids like to fit in because it means more friends and less bullying.  But often times, fitting in comes with a big price tag – in this case, it’s $58 for a pair of sweatpants…. and your immortal soul.

The message I wanted to send to my daughter, and to Michael Jeffries for that matter, is that it’s wrong to discriminate against someone based solely on his or her appearance.  And when we bear witness to that atrocity, we need to rally against it and prove that we care more about justice than we do about the label on our shirt.

BAN THE MOOSE!!!

I think the only reason Michael Jeffries still has a job, is because he chose overweight people as his target.  If he had blatantly stated that he didn’t want any minorities wearing Abercrombie & Fitch, he probably would’ve been fired and then burned over a pyre of his own overpriced clothing (or at least made to pay $50 million dollars in racial discrimination lawsuits like he did back in 2004).  But it seems a person’s weight is still fair game in the world of discrimination – whereas discrimination based on race, religion and sex (while still undeniably present) are a bit more taboo, more camouflaged  behind bureaucratic bullshit.

It is still socially acceptable to crack a few fat jokes, and portray overweight people in the media as lazy, unattractive and gluttonous.  These movie/TV characters are often seen as punchlines, not people – sadly, I think the same holds true off the big screen as well…. especially where Michael Jeffries and his stupid moose boxer shorts are concerned.

By saying that he only markets to “cool and good-looking” kids is the equivalent of saying that he doesn’t want ugly, fat kids wearing his brand (or working in his stores).  This guy has balls the size of cantaloupes not only for making such a brazen statement, but also for saying it while looking like this….

The only thing this guy should be railing against
is plastic surgery and botox injections.

But there is one thing I love about Michael Jeffries’ statement – that he shot himself in the foot with it.  The world now knows him for the shallow, elitist prick he is, and it’s my fervent wish that his company will be deemed just as pathetic as his attempts to hold onto his youth.

 

Once Was Lost and Now I’m Clowned

From a very young age, we’re taught to say thank you every time someone does something nice for us. So that by the time we’re adults, we no longer need our parents to nag us about using our manners – saying thank you becomes as reflexive as changing the channel when Honey boo-boo comes on TV.

But how often do we truly feel grateful?

I’ve made attempts to focus on my feelings of gratitude in the past.  I thought about starting a gratitude journal, but then decided that buying a rock with the word “gratitude” engraved on it was way easier.  No joke, I actually spent 5 dollars for a rock in an effort to feel more grateful…. but all it did was make me feel like Charlie Brown after a failed night of trick-or-treating.

“I got a feeling of deep inner peace.”
“I got a rock.”

The first day I had the rock, I clutched it in my hands, and tried to meditate on all the things I’m grateful for: the health and well-being of my family, a roof over my head, food on the table, and half-naked pictures of Channing Tatum over the internet.  Clearly, my cup of gratitude runneth over.

But I only used the rock once, and then forgot about it.  Its only function for the past year has been to collect dust and occasionally remind me that I’m an ingrate.

The feeling of taking things for granted spilled over into my blog as well – I recently realized that I am the black hole of gratitude when it comes to the blogging world.  Clearly, I’m not that great at it outside the blogging world either, but I’ll save that for a future blog post I’ll entitle “The Dalai Lama Thinks I’m an Asshole.”  For now, let’s focus on blogging.

When I first created my blog, I had only one goal in mind – gain a huge following so that some important publisher will see my writing, realize how awesome I am, and I’ll score a book deal.  Period.  I wasn’t interested in making friends with other bloggers, reading their posts, or commenting on them…. unless it served to further my cause.

When I was in the rare mood to comment, I would purposefully search for other bloggers who wrote about topics that I chose, and then comment on them with a link back to the blog I had written.  “You like cupcakes?  What a co-ink-e-dink!!  I’m a Total Crack Whore for Cupcakes too!”  Yep, I was THAT guy.  Bet the Dalai Lama isn’t the only one who thinks I’m an asshole now, huh?

There were a few exceptions to this rule – I ran to bloggers like Jules, La La, and Maggie  for entertainment because they were funny as hell and made for a great escape from the depressing 10 o’clock news.  But even though I loved them more than a bachelorette party loves tequila shots, I still rarely commented on their blog entries.  Again, BIG. BLACK. HOLE.  Sorry, ladies….

            

I managed to take the social part entirely out of social media.  For the most part, I lurked in the shadows, and waited for opportunities to spring my awesomeness on unsuspecting bloggers.  I replied to comments made on my blog, but rarely visited those bloggers to find out more about the person behind the praise.  They loved me, and that was all I needed to know.

Ego party – table for one, please.

I’d like to tell you that I outgrew this sort of newbie blogger behavior in my first few months, but since I’ve already told you about my chin hair and saggy boobs in previous entries, it seems a little silly to start lying now.

Just a couple of weeks ago, I was sitting in my evil blogger lair, creepily fingering my mustache (yeah, I have one of those too), and pondering ways to increase my blog traffic.  I had hit a wall, and my follower numbers had become stagnant.  I needed to find a way to tap into the main vein that led to the heart of the blogging world.  One name immediately sprang to mind – Le Clown.  I had seen his clown face plastered in the comment sections of nearly every blog I visited.  He was everywhere.  If anyone could get me more numbers, it was him.

The face of my dreams…. and my nightmares.

But first, I had to get his attention….

I thought of sending him nude pictures of myself, but thankfully my low self-esteem stepped in and reminded me about my granny boobs before I did anything I would regret.  Then I decided that being direct was probably best idea.  The I’m-awesome-you’re-awesome-let’s-make-sweet-bloggy-music-together approach.

I posted in his blog section called Carnies’ Corner – a little nook he set up to give new bloggers someplace to shamelessly promote themselves (like I needed any more encouragement).  Since he claimed to check out any bloggers who posted there, I thought I was guaranteed at least a little look-see from him.

No one was more surprised than me when I got a hell of a lot more than that….

He enjoyed my writing, and made hysterical comments on my About the Author page.  Fantastic.

He endorsed my blog in a post he entitled Sharing the Wealth.  Blogger ecstasy!

He offered me an invitation to guest blog on Black Box Warnings.  After hyperventilating, passing out, and being resuscitated by my cats, I happily accepted.

He extended me his hand in friendship.  Great, now I felt like a dick.

He called me his new BFF4EVS™, spoke sweet words of French like “coup de coeur” and charmed the fucking pants right off me.  And as I sat there, humbled and pantsless, I realized that Le Clown had succeeded where my overpriced rock had failed – I was positively oozing gratitude out of every orifice. (How’s that for a nice visual?)  I was inspired to change my narcissistic ways and try to follow in this clown’s footsteps – some pretty big shoes to fill.

Not only is the incomparable Le Clown persona living inside those enormous shoes, there is also a decent, compassionate Canadian in there as well.  Sure, I have to put up with him extolling the many virtues of poutine and coffee, and forcing me to use Google translate  just so I can understand him.  But when you find a friend who makes you laugh and think in equal measure, it’s worth all the nasty cheese curds in the world.

Dear Canada,
What did the poor french fries ever do to you?
Signed, Nauseous in NY

Poutine pushing aside, Le Clown does a lot of good for the blogging community.  There’s a tremendous amount of thought and heart behind everything he puts out there in the blogosphere, and I think he takes a lot of pleasure in paying it forward so that other bloggers might share in his success.  He’s sort of like Mother Teresa…. if she cursed, spoke French and was egotistical enough to talk about herself in the third person.

I, on the other hand, am still a work in progress.  But I can honestly say that I’ve read and commented on more blogs in the past two weeks than I have all year.  And whenever I think I’m too pressed for time to spend a few minutes cruising through WordPress, I remind myself that Le Clown not only accomplishes that feat, he also manages to juggle a job, three blogs, a wife, and kids as well.  I think the man is allergic to sleep, or he’s allotted more hours in the day up there in Canada.  I can’t figure out how he gets it all done.  But now that I see it IS possible, he has given me something to strive for.

When I began my quest for Le Clown, I thought I was only going to get more followers out of the experience, but what I gained was a lot more than numbers – I also got a healthy dose of perspective and a lesson in generosity.

And for that, I’m truly grateful.

Since we live 400 miles apart,
I had to use my voodoo powers to give him a hug….
this would have worked better if I had a lock of his hair.

Beware the Followers Made of Spam

Have you seen a burst of new followers on your blog in the last couple of weeks?  Well, before you pop the cork on the champagne bottle and toast yourself for being master of the blogiverse, first you’d better go see if your new followers actually have a pulse.

Why is he just laying there??

I have a lot of shortcomings as a blogger – PR work is right at the top of the list.  I’m no good at reading other people’s blogs and commenting on them, and I’m even worse at following WordPress’ advice when I get a new follower and they suggest, “You might want to go see what they’re up to! Perhaps you will like their blog as much as they liked yours!”  I might WordPress, but most days it’s hard to see anything passed the big pile of facebook memes and status updates that I’m buried beneath.

Since I wasn’t checking out all my new followers and sending them a dozen roses and a new puppy like WordPress suggested, when I saw my follower numbers start to climb at an abnormally fast rate, it took me awhile before I realized something was amiss.  I just thought people were finally beginning to realize how completely awesome I am…. seemed like a logical conclusion at the time.

Somewhere after gaining over 100 followers in two weeks, a light bulb went on in my head – even I’m not that awesome (but if you want to refute that point, I won’t argue).  A rapid increase in my following happened each time I got Freshly Pressed, but that made sense because of the increase in traffic; I was getting thousands of hits a day, so statistically, I was bound to find a few people who wanted to jump on board my blog.  But now, my views were pitifully low – under 50 most days.  So what gives?  I decided to put on my Sherlock Holmes hat and sniff out the answer.

As it turns out, the answer smelled a lot like Spam.

I got out my trusty pen and paper, blew the dust off of them (because really, who the hell uses a pen and paper anymore?), and went to work sifting through all these so-called followers.  I made a “phony spam” and “real deal” column on my paper and kept track each time I visited a follower’s blog site.  Before I knew it, I had more spam than my Grandma after she accidentally visited a porn site…. it’s okay Grandma, we all know it was an “accident”.

Hot damn, that’s a lot of spam!!

I found that my followers fell into four categories:

The dead end.  When you click on their web address, you are led to a page telling you that they don’t exist.  Well, where the hell did they go?  They were obviously there a minute ago.  Was clicking the follow button on my blog the last thing this person did before keeling over?  Perhaps finding me was enough to make them feel as though they could die happy now.  Or do my followers just have a shorter lifespan than most fruit flies?

R.I.P. Archangel. Enjoy your travels to other side – bring me back a t-shirt!!

The used car salesman.  People that aren’t really people – they’re companies trying to sell you stuff.  Well, listen up assholes – because you got me all excited about having a new follower, and then turned out to be just another cog in the corporate greed-machine, I’d rather drive to Wal-Mart on black Friday to shop than buy anything you’re selling.

Bitch, I don’t NEED a name badge – I already know who the hell I am…. most days.

Ummmm….. what?  These followers are a tricky bunch because I can’t tell if they fit into the spam column or the real one – probably because I can’t understand a fucking thing they’re saying.  They look like legitimate blog sites because they have dated blog entries and followers of their own (most WAY more than me).  But because nothing is in English, I can’t tell if they’re writing about legitimate things or if they’re trying to sell me internal organs from the black market.  If it’s the latter, I could really use a new gallbladder guys – mine got cut out six months ago….

2,800 followers for naked bicycle riding articles?? I might have to rethink a few things….

It’s ALIVE!!  Real people.  These followers are the reason I sit down to write everyday…. well, almost everyday…. okay, about twice a month.  The ones who read my stuff, and decide that they want to read more of whatever I write about in the future.  When they click my follow button, it’s because they think my problematic chin hair is hysterical, and they can’t wait to see what other gross things happen to my body as I get older.  I LOVE YOU GUYS!!

You guys should follow her – Problems by the dozen
Her name is Bel, and she’s very funny… and Canadian.
What more could you ask for?

Lovely, faithful (REAL) readers aside, these fake followers have managed to suck one of the true joys out of blogging – the excitement of watching your follower numbers climb.  Every time I gained a new follower, it was an affirmation that I’m a good writer.  But now, that number is meaningless.  I know I earned the first 643 of those followers, but every one after that is a mystery.

WordPress, you do such a fantastic job of blocking spam comments from making their way onto our blogs, can’t you do the same for spam followers?  Please find a way to protect my innocent eyes (yeah, right… who am I trying to kid?) from having to see any more pictures of naked people riding bicycles.  PLEASE!!  And restore the kid-on-Christmas-morning joy that used to come from seeing our blog audiences grow.

A new blog follower just for ME?
Thanks WordPress, it’s just what I always wanted!!

Some Lessons Death Taught Me About Life

My father passed away two weeks ago.  Since then, I feel like I’ve been thrown off my axis – like my world has stopped spinning, but everyone else’s has just kept right on going as if nothing’s happened. It makes me feel slow and lost – like I’m always racing to catch-up to everyone else, but can’t. My brain has totally shut down and can’t seem to process anything concrete – all I can do is grapple with my emotions.

I know exactly how you feel, Kid.

But life is a stubborn bitch, and refuses to be ignored for long.  When you least expect it, life barges in and demands that you pay attention because it has a lesson or two it wants to teach you.  Even though I felt like my brain would explode from the effort, I tried to pay close attention.  I figured that if I looked attentive enough, maybe life would leave me alone long enough to catch an afternoon nap.

Here’s what I’ve learned so far….

Go Acquire Some Funeral Attire:  I’m a jeans and t-shirt kind of girl, so when it comes to dressy attire, I usually have to scrounge around in the back of my closet to find anything appropriate (and then pray that it still fits).  You can plan a shopping trip for something to wear to a wedding, but it’s difficult to do for a funeral.  You should have at least one black suit or dress on hand at all times.  Otherwise you may find yourself tearfully begging a sales lady for help in finding a piece of black clothing that’s as comfortable as the pajamas you wish you were wearing.

God, please let there be a pair of black pants in here somewhere….

Starve a Cold, Feed a Griever:  I’ve sent flowers and fruit baskets to people for all sorts of reasons – birthdays, anniversaries, and various holidays.  But I’ve never sent them to someone who was grieving; I usually pick up the phone instead.  But what I recently learned is that sometimes, the person in mourning doesn’t have the energy or desire to talk to anyone, but they still want to know people are thinking about them – that’s where heart shaped pineapples and chocolate dipped strawberries come in handy!  Although, cookies, muffins, or assorted goodies would work too because they all say the same thing, “This basket of stuff is ridiculously expensive, but I love you and don’t mind having to eat Ramen noodles for the rest of the week in order to pay for it.”

It’s hard to be depressed when you’re stuffing your face with chocolate covered yumminess.

Hugging 101:  When we are kids, we hug with our whole body, clinging to the target of our affection like little, balding monkeys.  Then as we get older, propriety steps in and our hugs lose a little bit of their fervor, sometimes feeling no warmer than a handshake.  But being wrapped up in a heartfelt hug can be more effective than a handful of Xanax at easing depression – because when you feel like your world is shattering into a million pieces, sometimes all it takes to keep it together is someone else’s arms.

I tried doing this with my cats,
but they don’t seem to share my appreciation for hugging.

United We Stand, Divided We Bawl:  Get yourself an arsenal of good friends because they are like the biological weapons in the war against grief.  I found comfort and support among family because we were all mourning the same loss.  But I turned to my friends for an escape from the insanity.  My friends sympathized with me, but more importantly, they gave me a reason to laugh again.  After crying hard enough to make my eyes burn and my head pound, laughter was the best gift they could’ve given me.  Well, that and the awesome fruit basket.

Our love for each other remains as big as our hair was back in the 90′s.

Regret Sucks More Than the First Twilight Movie:  How often do you get the urge to call, text, or visit someone just to say hello or I love you?  Now how often do you ACT on those urges?  Too often we shelve those impulses because we allow other things to get in the way.  Work, kids, food shopping, or cutting our toenails become the priority because we assume we can make that call or visit tomorrow.  It isn’t until tomorrow is abruptly taken away that we begin to mentally tally up all those missed opportunities, and then the crappy feeling of regret sets in.  We can’t do much about the regrets of the past – whether you blew off calling Mom, or made the mistake of sitting through another one of Kristen Stewart’s movies, try to learn from those regrets and work towards avoiding them in the future.

Eat Your Goddamn Vegetables:  I’ll admit that if all the vegetables on Earth were destroyed in some sort of veggie apocalypse, it would probably take me a year to notice.  And don’t even get me started on exercising or my loathe/hate relationship with my treadmill.  Clearly, I wasn’t born with whatever healthy-living-genes Jillian Michaels seems to have in abundance (don’t get me started on her either).

But when I hit my thirties I got a serious wake-up call that implored me to take better care of myself – a front row seat to my father’s triple bypass surgery, and my best friend’s battle with lung disease.  When you see a prolonged illness suck the will to live right out of someone you love, you find out that there is a lot of truth behind the phrase, “If you haven’t got your health, you haven’t got anything.”  If you’re like me, you hate to hear preachy clichés like that– especially when you’ve got a donut in your hand.  But I’m saying it anyway.  So do yourself a favor and eat a freakin’ string bean once in a while.  Okay?

Except during girl’s night out.

Don’t Sweat the Small Stuff:  Good grief Linda, how many clichés are you going to throw at us in one blog entry?!  Sorry, I know this slogan has been stamped on a million different coffee mugs, t-shirts and bumper stickers – but again, it’s true.  Let your grudges and petty annoyances go – the guy who cut you off in traffic or the co-worker who drank the last of the coffee isn’t going to spend a single second thinking about you.  So, why should you waste hours of precious time imagining all the different ways you could kill them and avoid trace evidence?  Especially when Google can do it for you in seconds….

I Double Dog Dare You:  Accomplishing something we didn’t think we were capable of is exhilarating.  Which is why I’m urging you to push aside all the imaginary roadblocks you’ve created for yourself (lack of time, money, ability, etc.), and take on a task that you find challenging.

I will be facing two challenges this summer.  Initially, both of them scared the crap out of me because there’s movement involved – a lot of movement; and I’m pretty sure I can’t bring my couch and TV remote along with me.  But after a little bit of thought (and a lot of alcohol), I decided to push past my fears and see if I’m still capable of surprising myself.

Here are the two upcoming events:

The 5K Foam Fest – I’m going to need a chiropractor and a few drinks when this race is over.  And I’m sure I’ll be spending the better part of a week cleaning mud out of places that should NEVER get muddy. But it looks like a hell of a lot of fun…..

The Long Island walk to help fight breast cancer – 2 days, 35 miles, and probably a boatload of blisters.  If you would like to help me raise money for this great cause (without the nasty blisters), all you have to do is click the link below and pull out your credit card. Personally, I think you’ve got the better end of this deal…..

https://www.li2daywalk.org/donor_info.asp?MEMBERID=13166

If everyone who reads this donates just FIVE dollars, I can reach my fund raising goal of $1,000!!

BRING. IT. ON!!!!

Dear Dad…..

I got the call from Lesley this morning at 6:00am.  I can’t even imagine the strength it took for her to make that call – having to somehow find the words to tell me that my Dad had passed away last night.  She did the best she could…. tried so hard to be gentle.  I lost my shit anyway.  I didn’t hear anything she said beyond, “He’s gone.”  I couldn’t hear anything over the sound of my own screaming and wailing.

There were no questions at that moment – Why?  When?  How?  It didn’t matter.  All that mattered was that yesterday you were here, and now you’re gone.  And with you, all the memories we had yet to create.

You just retired a week ago.  You were counting down the days until retirement for the last few years – couldn’t wait to practice your golf swing, and start racking up the miles on your bicycle.  You spent the last fifty years busting your ass, and you were finally going to enjoy some well-deserved rest and relaxation.  I could practically hear the smile in your voice over the phone as you told me about how you were going to sleep in as late as you wanted on your first day of freedom.

I should have called you to find out how it felt to not have to wake up to an alarm clock that morning.  I thought of calling you a dozen times this past week, but when I finally dialed your number, it was too late.

I got your answering machine….

“Hey Dad, it’s Linda.  I’m calling you in the middle of the day just because I can now – we’re finally on the same schedule.  How cool is that?!  I hope you’re out playing golf or doing something fun.  Give me a call back when you can.  Love you.”

But that’s not all I wanted to say…..

Had you been there to pick up the phone, I would have told you that I had thought a lot about our birthdays coming up – you were turning 70 and I was turning 40 this summer.  I wanted to say that I didn’t want anything from you that came in a box.  That suggestion I made about the diamond earrings was just a joke.  We both know I’m not the diamonds-are-a-girl’s-best-friend type.  They would go horribly with my converse sneakers.

What I wanted more than anything was a memory.  Growing up with hundreds of miles between us, we didn’t have much opportunity to create memories together.  Jobs, kids, crazy schedules, and the physical distance always seemed to get in the way.  I think we were both counting on your retirement clearing away some of those obstacles, and finally allowing us some time to get to know one another better.  I know I was counting on it.  I didn’t realize just how much until that time was taken away from me with one phone call.

I feel grief-stricken.  Robbed.  Angry.  Regretful.

I’m mad at myself for taking so much for granted.  Even though your health wasn’t the best these past few years, I still stupidly thought you would be there to create all the memories I had only dreamt about.  I was going to share one of those dreams with you over the phone that day….

I imagined us going on one of your 30-mile bike rides together this summer; both to commemorate our milestone birthdays and to stubbornly prove that age is just a meaningless number.  I thought one or two days of pedaling together, bitching about the hot Florida heat, and laughing at all the old-timers in spandex bike shorts, sounded like the perfect birthday present.  Then at the end of the day we’d compare sore muscles to see whose ass hurt more, and you’d attempt to teach me how to cook one of your signature dishes – all the while I’d be nodding my head, but hopelessly lost.  After dinner you’d insist on topping off the meal with dessert – who am I to argue with homemade strawberry shortcake?  But it would taste extra sweet that night because we’d know that we earned every one of those delicious calories.

That’s just one of a thousand would-be memories I have swimming around in my head right now.  I’m trying desperately to hang on to the happy memories we did manage to create and let go of the rest, but I have to admit that right now I’m not having much luck.

I can’t promise that the sting of regret won’t taint those happy memories, but here’s what I can promise:

I promise to take that 30-mile bike ride this year, even though I won’t have you pedaling by my side.

I promise to honor both of our weight loss efforts, and pass up on more donuts than I eat…. I can’t promise the same about coffee cake – but I know you’ll understand.

I promise to make the most out of the gifts you gave me:  your sarcastic sense of humor, your love and talent for the written word, and your immense capacity to love anything on four furry-feet.

I promise not to complain too much about some of the physical traits I inherited from you:  the odd long torso/short legs combo, the ability to gain weight when even pondering a trip to Dunkin’ Donuts, and that deep crease I get in between my eyes when I’m looking at someone like they’re nuts.

I’d like to ask you to promise me something in return.  Promise me that there is something beyond this crazy, fucked up world where nobody seems to ever get what they deserve.  Promise me that you’ll do your best to protect and comfort those of us who are still stuck down here, missing you.  And promise me that when it’s my time to go, you’ll be waiting there for me.

I hope there are bicycles in heaven….

My Tea Tastes Like Chili….

(And Other Reasons I’ll Never Be Featured in Good Housekeeping Magazine)

Unless you’ve been hiding under a rock, chances are you’ve heard the saying “Don’t judge a book by its cover” uttered a few (thousand) times – especially when one of your girlfriends tries to hook you up with a guy who “has a great personality”, but looks like Robert Carradine from the 80′s movie Revenge of the Nerds.

The face that froze a thousand vaginas.

I agree that we should look beyond a person’s exterior in order to discover what truly matters – like whether or not the guy wears boxers or tighty-whities.  But people aside, there is one thing in life that I believe should ONLY be judged by what’s on the surface  – my house.  I’m hoping that whoever walks in the door won’t find out that the appearances I work very hard to keep up…. well, maybe not that hard…. okay, not hard at all…. are about as superficial as Pamela Anderson’s boobs.

Hey! Eyes up here people, I was talking about my HOUSE. Remember?

If you delve beneath the creamy, white surface… wait, I’m still thinking about Pamela Anderson’s boobs.  Sorry.  What I meant to say was that beneath the surface of my house’s tidy façade lies a dusty underbelly, exposed to any houseguest who dares to look too closely.

Here are my 7 deadly sins of housekeeping.  Neat freaks might want to look away….

1.  My tea tastes like Chili:  I reheated my mug of tea in the microwave this morning and when I took a sip, all I tasted was chili – not exactly the pick me up I was looking for at 7:00am.  Upon closer inspection, I could see that my microwave still contained the spattered remains of my husband’s chili dinner from the night before.   I knew when I opened the door of the microwave that it smelled like chili but I thought, “How bad could it be?”  The answer – fucking horrible.

It’s not just the microwave that looks like a graveyard for the ghost of dinners past, it’s every appliance in my kitchen.  I can handle a certain amount of gunk and grease, but I have to take action when I end up with tea that a vegetarian would find morally offensive.

Why does it smell like someone tried to microwave a hamster in here??

2.  Closets, they’re not just for coats anymore:  Actually, they’re almost never for coats anymore – that’s what the couch, doorknobs, and playroom floor is for.  Our closets are predominantly for housing old toys, clothes, and mementos.  I feel compelled to save useless crap like my son’s 2^nd grade report card – what if he wants to know how he did in school when he’s too old and senile to remember?  He might enjoy finding out that he never followed directions and couldn’t keep his mouth shut in class.

The problem with running a sentimental storage facility is that things tend to pile up after 14-years of parenting.  So, snoopers beware – if you’re nosey enough to go poking around in my closets, expect to encounter something like this when you open the door….

Only instead of snow,
you’ll probably be buried alive in macaroni art and finger paintings.

3.  Even Mr. Clean can’t help me now:  Cleaning the bathroom is like the pap smear of household chores (guys, you can insert prostate check into that metaphor instead…. insert is probably a bad word to use there).  It’s necessary but dreaded, and when it’s over you’re exhausted and feel like smoking a cigarette.  Or maybe that’s just me.

I procrastinate for weeks, and watch with a growing sense of dread as the dried toothpaste stains and soap scum advance and eventually gain ground.  I usually call on Mr. Clean right before they stage a coup and push conditions too close to public bathroom territory.  After I have won the disinfectant war (what’s with all the military imagery, Linda?), I make my husband and kids come into the freshly scrubbed bathroom to admire how shiny and scuzz-free it is.

“Isn’t it clean?  Look – the shower walls aren’t slimy anymore!!” I boast as I show off my sparkly-clean bathtub with all the pageantry of Vanna White on Wheel of Fortune.

They’re never quite as impressed as I think they should be.

4.  Dust bunnies – the pets you don’t have to feed:  I’m not sure dust bunnies is an accurate description of what I have in my house – by the time I get around to dusting they’re more like dust llamas.  I hate dusting almost as much as I hate cleaning the bathroom.  Wiping down tabletops is no big deal, it’s the time consuming dusting that I have a problem with – the curtains, blinds, ceiling fans, bookshelves, etc.  I usually wait until those things start to look fuzzy before I resign myself to the chore.

If you ever want to see it snow in July, just come on over to my house and I’ll turn on my ceiling fans for you.  If we get drunk enough, we can have fun dancing around in the “snow” like Winona Ryder in Edward Scissorhands.  It’ll be magical.

5.  A place for everything…. but dammed if I know where it is:  Where can you find a staple gun, fruitcake and lint roller all living in harmony together?  The answer is on my kitchen countertop.  In any other house, this area might be used as an eat-in counter, equipped with some hip bar stools and matching placemats.  Like this….

Why can’t I live in a house where my mugs match my chairs??

But instead, this counter (and pretty much every other flat surface in the house) acts like a landing strip for all the crap nobody knows what to do with.  I’m sure if I thought long and hard about where all this stuff belongs, I could find a proper home for all of it (in the garbage).  But who has the time?  The past four seasons of Modern Family aren’t just going to watch themselves.

I don’t have time to clean AND decorate for the holidays -
don’t you think the nutcracker make my crap look really festive?

6.  Martha Stewart can kiss my ass:  The beds in my house are never made.  Well, that’s not entirely true – when it comes time to put on clean sheets, I make the bed. But the other 29 days of the month, my bed looks like it fell victim to a dozen chimpanzees with restless leg syndrome.  And yes, I only wash my sheets once a month – but that shouldn’t gross out anyone reading this because the neat freaks were already warned to look away.  Remember?  You might want to heed my warning this time because it only gets worse from here.

I had high hopes when I finally bought the four-poster bed of my dreams.  I bought a pretty comforter set with matching throw pillows to complete the Martha Stewart vision I had created in my head.  But after about a week, the bed stopped being made and the throw pillows found their way into a corner of the room; and there they stayed in a decorative pile, giving the dust bunnies yet another place to hide.

The Martha Stewart fantasy….

The Oscar Madison reality.

7.  My recipe for homemade raisins:  Chances are, if I have to get down on my hands and knees to clean it, it doesn’t get cleaned.  Who am I, Cinderella?   The areas under the couch (and any other piece of furniture) are usually neglected unless one of the kids loses a favorite toy (read that as an iPod or Nintendo DS) and we have to turn the whole house upside down to find it.  That’s when science-project-level grossness is discovered.  Stuff like this….

Homemade raisins – easy to make and you’ll never need to take penicillin again!

I know you’re jealous, and want to find out how you can make your own homemade couch raisins,

so I’ll share the recipe with you:

1. Give child a bag of grapes as a snack.
2. Assume child eats bag of grapes.
3. Assume child properly disposes of bag instead of shoving it under the couch.
4. Discover that all your assumptions were really, really WRONG.

I warned you it got worse, but you didn’t want to listen.

I Accidentally Killed Santa Claus

We were still a few weeks away from Thanksgiving, but as my daughter and I entered our local mall I could see signs that the Christmas season was already beginning to rear its overly commercialized head.  I’m not normally a scrooge, but I morph into one when I see people decking the halls before they’ve had the chance to digest their turkey dinner.  I think that as long as the turkeys of the world are blissfully unaware that they are about to have an ass full of stuffing, Christmas should be nothing more than a tinseled speck on the horizon.

 

I guess the management at JCPenny didn’t care that I had just gone trick-or-treating with my kids or that I had no desire to have Santa crammed down my throat along with all the leftover Halloween candy.  The department store was already dripping with tacky Santa sweaters and twinkle lights.  As I tried to find the nearest exit, my ears picked up the familiar strains of “Frosty the Snowman” over the speaker system – it was my very first Christmas carol of the season and I had barely had the chance to step one foot into the month of November.  When I heard the first few chords, I looked around in disbelief, searching for some store employee to blame for the auditory assault. When I caught the eyes of a woman who worked there, I vaguely pointed in the direction of the offensive sound and mouthed the word, “Really?”  She shrugged sadly as if to say, “At least you don’t have to listen to this shit all day long.”

My 13-year old daughter, Meghan, was oblivious to my souring mood as she made her way over to the jewelry department.  Now thanks to Frosty the (unwelcome) snowman, I immediately started thinking about what Christmas presents to buy for her as she commented on the jewelry she liked.  I guess I fell right into the department store’s not so subtle consumer trap – hook, line and credit card.

Teenagers are notoriously difficult to buy presents for, and that goes double for teenage girls…. quadruple if it’s a gift of clothes or jewelry for a teenage girl.  You might as well just hand them the receipt for the item, along with your apologies for not even coming close.  I know that if it’s the wrong color, or there’s an offensive sparkle in the wrong place, the gift will be given a polite smile and then find it’s way to the bottom of their jewelry box or closet, never to be seen or heard from again.

I knew I needed some help, so while we perused through the glittery baubles I said, “You should get a jumpstart on your Christmas list for Santa… and adding in some pictures would be a big help.”  Then I gave her an exaggerated wink and a nudge with my elbow, and continued to browse.

Meghan approached me with a look of stunned disbelief on her face and said, “Was that the moment??”

I was drawing a blank.  ”You’re going to have to help me out because I didn’t wear my teenager decoder ring today.  What moment?” I asked.

“The moment every kid talks about – the one where their parent KILLS their childhood.”

I thought she was joking around with me, so I smiled and said, “Shut up.  Don’t act like we haven’t talked about this before.”

We have talked about the whole Santa scam before… right?  My brain started to frantically backtrack through all of our meaningful mother/daughter talks.  Here’s the checklist I came up with:

1. Sex (check).  When she was about 9-years old, she wanted to know how babies were made.  I vividly remember her being grossed out when she understood what sex was and then realized her parents must have engaged in the behavior.  The conversation ended with a prolonged, “EWWWWWW!!!” and then she ran away.  Not exactly the bonding moment I had envisioned.

2. Menstruation (check).  She got her period when she was 12-years old – if you count all the friends she texted first, I was probably the fourth or fifth person to find out.  I guess I should be thankful I was in the top ten, and that I didn’t have to find out about it on facebook.  After her admission, I took her through all the fun period paraphernalia and told her that Advil would be her new best friend.

3. Drugs, alcohol and smoking (check, check, check).  We talked about the dangers of this stuff beginning in 3^rd or 4^th grade when I kept hearing stories about kids getting drunk and high in the 6^th grade.  I would be thrilled if she never touched any of it, but realistically I’m just hoping to get through her high school graduation without having to ever find her laying down drunk in a puddle of her own vomit.

As my mind raced, I kept coming up blank where Santa was concerned.  Could it be that we had covered all these weighty issues and glossed over the fact that jolly ol’ St. Nicholas was a total load of Christmas crap?  It seemed impossible.  Equally impossible was the fact that none of her friends or older cousins had filled her in on the hoax.  But the forlorn expression on her face confirmed my worst fear –

I HAD JUST KILLED SANTA CLAUS.

I tried to backpedal and pretend like I was just kidding, but it was too late – the fat man was out of the bag now, and there was no way of stuffing him back in.  I knew that Meghan would probably spend the next week mentally replaying all the lies I had told her over the years.  I could almost hear her future accusations, “You mean the EASTER BUNNY and the TOOTH FAIRY too?!  They were all LIES??”  Yes honey, but they were good lies.  (They must’ve been good for you to believe them for the last 13 years.)

As it turned out, I didn’t have to wait a whole week for the wheels in her brain to start turning – the kid always was too smart for her own good.  During the ride home from the mall, she spewed rapid-fire realizations at me, and all I could do was sit there and mentally calculate what this was going to cost me in therapy bills.

One of the best realizations she made was about our cat, Matilda.  Four years ago, Meghan woke up on Christmas morning to discover a new kitten under our tree that happened to have the same name as her favorite Roald Dahl book.  Now she knew that Santa had no part in giving her that cute, little furball.

“YOU found Matilda?” she asked.

“Yes!” I finally blurted out like a criminal who had reached the breaking point during a prolonged interrogation.  “And you have no idea how hard it is to find a kitten in winter!  The damn cats only mate in the spring!!  I had to visit half a dozen animal shelters before I found her and then I had to hide her at Grandma’s house until you went to bed on Christmas eve, and then…” I babbled on until the whole sordid story was told, and then we sat there in silence for a while.

It was my fervent wish that Meghan would grow to appreciate all the trouble my husband and I had gone through to create this fantastical ruse, and how difficult it was to maintain for so long.  But I knew that wish wasn’t going to come true anytime soon.   The few days that followed (what will now be referred to as “the Santa incident”) were spent with her saying things like, “I can’t believe you lied to me” and me feeling like Mommy Dearest right after she beat Christina with a wire hanger.

I guess we know who’ll be at the top of Santa’s naughty list this year…. will any of you be joining me?