Bite Me

L-I-V-I-N

Sunday I went to a BBQ in the country. There were horses at the house next door, and the kids and I walked over to the fence to feed them grass. The horses had names, but we named them for the brief time we were with them; Cow, Julie and China. We were standing with some other kids, who were clearly from the country because they had no hesitations as they fed the horses. George joined the likes of them, and loudly giggled as he pet the horses head and wet nostrils. Kiki would throw the grass at the the fence and shriek.
The horses started getting excited and antsy from being around the kids. China, the littlest horse of the three, was behind Julie, trying to push her way through. Julie was annoyed by the little horse, and she turned around and bit her on the neck. All the kids were defensive of little China, and said things like, "Julie should go to time out for biting," and "Biting is bad, Julie." When China didn't take the hint, Julie kicked her in the ribs. I got nervous that this was the beginning of a horse brawl, where the wire fence wouldn't protect us from flailing horse feet.
"Ok, one last feeding, then we need to go." Kiki threw her grass at the fence while screaming, and we walked back to the BBQ.

I started this blog almost a year and a half ago. I thought I'd make it a hipster fashion blog, but I quickly realized there are thousands of other people out there doing it better, and I'm not as passionate about fashion as I'd hope to be. My flex rules about workout clothes in lieu of outfits builds the case that I frequently have days where "I gave up" and "can't be bothered."
The blog morphed into nonfiction narrative, funny stories from my day-to-day. I think the stories can be a bit shock value, but they are my truths, and truth can be fucking ugly sometimes. The blog allows me to be creative, and gives me a lot of happiness. I am proud of it, and I have my favorite posts, and my least favorites.
One of my first posts is about leggings and visible panty line, VPL. It is my most frequently viewed post because it shows up in search engines for people looking to jack off to fat asses in legging. I am not fucking you. My Blog Statistics shows "Fat Ass in Leggings" too often for me not to cringe, but it drives traffic, so I'm grateful for that.
Kim Kardshian gets loads of shit because she is always tweeting her nakedness. She likes to think people who are unimpressed with her are slut shaming her, but really they are just saying, if you want to get the R-E-S-P-E-C-T then don't flash your junk to the world. I don't really care either way. There are times when I wake up, and after stripping down to get in the shower, admire myself for way too long in the mirror. Sometimes, I take pictures because I think, "I might want to see this one day."
So yeah, I can't just hand my phone over to someone to flip through pictures because I have too many naked photos of myself on there. On a side note, to discuss in more depth at a later date, is it gay and incestuous to jerk off after taking naked pictures? (Whats with trying to label everything? It's the fashionista in me.)
Would I be embarrassed if my naked pics were out there? I doubt it because I probably wouldn't take so many if I weren't somewhat proud of them (I delete the ugly ones, of course.) Kimmy Kardashian is annoying because her slut shaming essay says she's proud of herself, even her flaws. Listen, slut, were happy you're happy you're a slut, but when you call your blow-up-doll plastic surgery constructed self "flawed," it can make other people say, "if she's flawed, then what the hell does that say about the rest of us who aren't willing to get cut up for our beauty?" Her slut pride celebrates sexuality but reaffirms truly ridiculous beauty standards.

So I go with the flow with my blog. Sometimes it's funny stories, sometimes it's serious shit, movie or book reviews, feminist rants, and other times just tired streams of consciousness. I'm putting out my truth, and beauty is in the head of the reader, but if someone has a problem with the story, or wants me to tame it down, well, please accept my flaws, or else, you can Bite Me, in which case you will be sent to Time Out, without any screen time.

Spring Break

You've GOT to be kidding me

Today I'm officially on spring break. Bust out the bikini, it's party time. Not really. All this means is I get to work on my screenplay for a week without feeling guilty I'm not doing work for my class.
The students took their midterm yesterday. I might be too easy on them, with the hints. Since they have already realized I'm a pushover, I will have to wait till next term to be more of a stern no-nonsense teacher who has high expectations, and doesn't ever feel sympathetic towards someone who has clearly blanked on the information. It is the same students who come up and ask questions in a round about way of saying, "I have no fucking idea how to do this," or, "I forgot."
Some people would rather not ask. They are intelligent, but they would rather not ask and get the hint, and turn in the wrong answer.  I respect them for that.
One of my students asked to take the test early, she said, "I booked a trip to Cabo for spring break, and I totally forgot I have class on Wednesday."
I was laughing because that is so silly, and I let her take it early. It was during our class intermission when she asked, so we were in the front of the room, and the students who didn't run out of class to try and test out if the Starbucks line is going to make them late for class, sat in their seats playing on their cell phones. They seemed distracted as she explained she is having a hard time with the class, and subscribed to an online resource where video explain the material. In her words, "I'm paying fifty bucks for math-for-retards videos."
My jaw dropped. First of all, she is too young to say "retard." Thats such an eighties word, and it worked it's way out of popular vocabulary in the nineties when people learned about political correctness. My eyes widened, and I changed the subject. Surely the people playing Candy Crush didn't hear her the first time, but if she said it again, I'd think some eyes might look up. She is a funny girl, and the odds aren't so great that she will pass the class, but I'd be happy to have her in my class down the road when she needs to take it again because she is hilarious, when she isn't dropping R bombs.

Monday I caught someone cheating on a quiz. That night I told my husband about the cheater. I was angry because this kid took advantage of my generosity. This student is a regular at my office hours, and I feel like he's been blowing smoke up my ass all this time, a deceitful ass kisser. In my office hour we work most of the quiz problems, almost the exact problems, before class, so to cheat is asinine since he just saw the answer fifteen minutes prior, and these quizzes are not worth much in the overall grade. I said to my husband, "I'm embarrassed for him. I'm embarrassed for his family." I could have sounded much more sensei, had I finished it up with, "He does dishonor to his family," but I didn't. Seriously though, his face makes me want to blow fire out of my mouth and scorch all the hair off his head.
This morning George and I went to the park with my friend who is a part time elementary school teacher. She said she always feels awful when she catches kids cheating. Her students are 10 years old, so she interprets it as the kid having too much stress and feeling overwhelming pressure. The guy I caught cheating is 20 years old, so maybe he has external pressure to succeed, but in this case, I don't feel sorry for him.
To me, cheating seems like it would be harder than studying. If I didn't give myself a heart attack during the act of cheating then the days following would be a tortuous period filled with hyper paranoia and guilt. The student who said the R word and forgets to attend class might not be able to squeeze by in this class, but the kid who studies regularly, attends class, but cheated on his quiz, is probably going to pass. I don't have any doubt here on who is going to live a happy life, failure is much more than a letter grade.

Emotional Hangover

So tired, but happy

Last night I was falling asleep and thought about the funniest thing. It's comical in itself, to be laughing out loud in a still dark room. I thought about earlier in the day when I gave George a bath. He ran around the house naked laughing and shrieking as I tried to wrangle him. When I managed to drop him in his bubble bath, he was still reeling from our cat and mouse game. He has doing a crab yoga pose, lifting his butt up and down. He started shouting, "Check this out guys," to me and Kiki. He was flopping his peen around and found it so neat-o he wanted to show this trick off by shouting, "Check this out guys!" over and over. I tried to not laugh because it might prompt him to do this in public sometime, like after swim lessons. So I acted slightly impressed, a little, "Whatevs. You've got your tricks, I've got mine."
Sunday I was fighting the Mean Reds like crazy. My idea to move to the East Coast is definitely under evaluation, since two weeks of rain had me bedridden. I'm not completely inclined to blame my valleys on the weather, I'm thinking it could have been an emotional hangover from the peak of elation preceding the weekend. Both my sisters had babies last week and I spent four days opera singing Life Is Beautiful while cooing over baby pics and face timing morning, noon and night.
Exhaustion compounded things; it didn't help Sunday was daylight savings time, so we lost an hour, and George woke up twice that night. The first time he woke in a screaming fit that he wanted to go to Carson City. This has happened before; he wakes up disoriented and fucking pissed, demanding he return to a certain place, like the car, shower, living room or my parents house. I think he wakes up from a dream and is totally confused why he is not in the place he just felt he was in, and then freaks the fuck out, because thats how he likes to deal with things.
The second time he woke up because he peed the bed. After changing the sheets and putting him in fresh pajamas, he went back to sleep.

When he started his morning hollering, I thought I might as well smother myself. I asked my husband what time it was and he said 6:30. I leaped from bed, ecstatic to have slept an hour later than George usually allows, but I quickly realized I jumped the gun, and it actually was his normal 5:30 torture time because of daylight savings.
Sunday I felt a bit like Brie Larson in Room when she is getting depressed in the room. I was being a shitty parent, hiding under my blankets, unable to communicate unless it was, "Could you please excuse me, I need some personal time." Room was such a disturbing movie to me, a film that "sticks to your ribs."
I spent the second half of my youth in South Lake Tahoe, and the year before I moved there Jaycee Dougard was kidnapped. Her picture was on every shop window, and we all heard the story of her being snatched off her bike on her way to the bus stop, with her step-dad chasing down the car. It was surreal when she was discovered, such incredible news. I can't imagine her mother's joy. I haven't read Dougard's book, and now I hear she is writing a second one. I don't think I will ever read it because, even though her story ended up being amazing, the decade in captivity would be unbearable.
I heard an interview of the man who kidnapped her, and all I got from it was this horrific line, "I don't know why anyone would ever let their kid walk to the bus stop."
My daughter is starting kindergarten in the fall, and I toured her school the other night. They explained how kids are dropped off at "curbside pickup." I can drop her on the curb and she is escorted to the gym, where she will wait with her class and be collected by their teacher.
I nearly fell over. I will never be able to drop this tiny little person off on the sidewalk and drive away. I'm going to park my car and walk her to the doorway of her classroom, every morning, because I heard this simple thought from an awful person.
After I watched Room, I stopped jogging in the street, and ran only on the treadmill because I thought too much about how you can get snatched right off the side of the road. It's been raining, so it's not like I've been fighting off an urge to go pound the pavement, but today, with the sun out and clear skies, I couldn't pass up being outside with running in my dark and damp garage.
My friend called while I was out and we chatted about work, kids and summer trips. She told me about her friend having a baby and getting a fucked up epidural. The same thing happened to me with George. The doctor fucking stabbed the epidural in too far, and ended up giving me a spinal tap. No one realized I was already at 10cm, and the baby needed to be pushed out immediately, but my entire fucking body was numb. It was one of the worst moments of my life because I was scared for my son, and panicked I might be paralyzed for the rest of my life, living in a hospital bed. After George was born, and I barfed all over myself, I laid there, and worried. I pictured Javier Bardem in The Sea Inside, and how he lived in a hospital bed as a quadraplegic and all he wanted to do was die. I started to feel tingling sensations after time passed, and began believing the doctor, that I was going to recover.
I don't know what happened after George arrived, but I have some sort of psychic powers since then. It could have been from the incident being so scary, feeling like we weren't going to make it. The psychic feelings might be fading, but for the first two years I felt like I was reliving time. Maybe I'm misdiagnosing feeling a slower pace of time, where my body and consciousness are slightly out of sync. I don't know, but it is fucking weird, but kind of awesome.
I read an article that said childbirth can lead to psychic abilities, so I guess if I ever had a third I might become full-blown psychic, and could start up a hotline. It would be cool. I could do a commercial where I wear a psychic hat, and shake my wand, repeating, "Check this out guys!"  I do not have a movie to compare this aspiration or experience to... Yet! One day. I can dream it up next time I'm reeling from an emotional hangover, hiding under my covers for hours recharging my batteries. With my weak psychic powers, I still have no way of knowing what George is going to do. He cracks me up all the time, even hours later, when I think about it, all alone in a dark room. 

Glass of Poop

George is such a little fireball. Lately he's been amusing himself by saying, fuck, a lot. I tried ignoring it, time outs, yelling and anger, but he doesn't give, well to put it in his words, two fucks.

The kid is always looking for a reaction. I tried to explain to him that he will get more attention and praise for saying nice things, and that's helped a little.

Our babysitter said she thinks he has derived the word from Trucks-and-bridges because most often when he says it he shouts, "fucks and bridges!"

My husband did some reading up on this, and today we implemented a new strategy. Every time he said fuck, we'd bring him a truck and say, "oh, a Truck! Here's your Truck!"

He actually was quite amused by it. We'd come up to him and speak very slowly, "Did you say Truck?!" And he'd smile. He's used to getting a negative reaction, but a reaction nonetheless, so when we weren't hauling him off to his room for time out but mimicking him by saying, "oh, truck, of course a truck," he felt satiated. 
Tonight we went over to our friends for dinner and George started giving me indications of being a noncompliant turd. He started by wandering around aimlessly whining. Then he looked at me with clenched fists. I walked over to him and kneeled in front of him. My strategy was to talk really loudly right when he goes to say it, so no one would be able to fully identify what he said. He shouted, "fuck," spit flinging from his mouth. I tried to sooth him, "Please, George, can you just relax?"
After a bout of demonstrating his power, he calmed down, and spent the last 45 minutes singing into a toy microphone by himself. I apologized to my friend before we left, and sent another sorry text from home.
We are not going on anymore playdates until George is set straight. Tomorrow were dedicating ourselves to reformation. I will not pretend I don't hear him saying "Fuck" so I don't have to drag his ass down to his room for a time out. He only does it for attention, and there are plenty of other things he can do instead that won't make my face turn beet red, and make me want to hit him upside the head.

We watched If You Give A Mouse A Cookie on Amazon Prime. There's only one episode, so of course they wanted to watch it four times in a row. We were singing the intro song together and then George came in for the chorus with, "If you give a mouse a poop, he's going to ask for a glass of poop." I reacted just as anyone would, laughing so hard my head hurt. He was beaming and I was happy he performed without relying on excessive shock value, just mild shock value. Making people laugh is his favorite thing. Whoever laughed whenever he said fuck for the first time, is on my shit list for life.

Farrah Fawcett Hair

Yesterday morning George and I drove to the other side of Sacramento to go to the nice Walmart. The Walmart in my neighborhood screams unattended mental institute. The last time we went to our Walmart Kiki and a crack head lady had a twenty minute conversation. Kiki kept asking the woman about the scarf on her head, and the woman kept telling Kiki about an apple cake she found in the bakery. As they both had an animated one-sided conversation I stood on the sidelines becoming increasingly anxious they would touch, and my daughter would be exposed to a vicious strain of under-belly bacteria.
After the thirty minute drive to the good Walmart, George started nodding off. And when I pulled into the parking lot he was fast asleep. Foiled by my sleeping kid, I had to drive back home to put him in bed. The drive was not a complete waste, as I turned the car around to go home, I took a picture of my hair in front of the Walmart sign.
I watched the movie Diary of a Teenage Girl. It's a really good movie. Kristin Wigg plays the mother, and she does a fabulous job, a slight redemption. The script is so funny. The mom, while claiming to be feminist, tells her daughter she ought to dress more provocative, since her youthful figure is temporary. She also criticizes and compliments her daughter's friend's hair, by saying it's pretty, in a a White-trash Farrah Fawcett sort of way.
I'm so happy times are changing, and we're seeing the trend move back from flat ironing hair toward a more voluminous eighties lamp-shade hair style. Flat ironing hair is one of those trends that I can't get on board with because it's a beauty regimen that would take me an hour. Yes, an entire hour, which is completely fucking nuts, especially since I run so I'd have to re-do this process every day. The reason flat ironing takes me so damn long is because I have Farrah Fawcett hair. I have to move the flat iron centimeter by centimeter on high heat to make it go from wiry to smooth.

With Sacramento rain, flat ironing seems even more asinine. Put in the hour to straighten hair, and then its wasted after quickly walking to the car. The much needed rain, in addition to making my hair a more lively lampshade, is making us have to get creative with our activities. We run around in the back yard a couple hours a day, and now were spending a lot of time at fast food places with indoor gyms. Last night the kids and I met up with friends for a playdate at an indoor gym equipped fast-food restaurant. The kids ran off to the play area and the mom and I chatted like crazy, only stopping to take a kid to the toilet every fifteen minutes.
She started slowly by remarking on her husband's inadequacies, and by the end of the two hours she had railed him hard as a lazy bag of bones who makes her job harder. This morning I needed to take an ibuprofen because my neck hurt from nonstop head shaking in an oh-no-he-didn't kind of way the night before.
Feeling compelled to commiserate, I fell down the rabbit hole, and started to match her stories with my own. I thought we'd laugh through stories of man vs. woman, and we did, but when we said goodbye and parted ways for the night, she looked unsettled and sad, and I left feeling bad, like I should have been telling her stories of how things can get better rather than indulging in stories of  men being good for only two things (a paycheck not even being an applicable comfort for her.)
This morning I woke up and had resonating feelings from the shit talking bender the night before, where all the things I complained about the night before were illuminated, and I was so easily annoyed, I sat cross armed in the corner glaring with a look of disappointment and judgement.
I went running, and realized I need to cool my jets. I apologized for waking up unbearably grouchy, and fessed up to all the trash I talked the night before. I have to get a grip when it comes to complaining. There is so much to be grateful, like changing hair trends, rain and having a happy little family. I really don't have time to dwell on the "room for improvement," I don't even have time to do my hair for fucks sake. Next time I hang out with my friend, when things start to go toward dwelling on the negative, I'll have to pull a conversation switch on her. I'll ask her if she has seen Diary of a Teenage Girl. Her husband will be Dad-of-the-year compared to Monroe, and that will kick-start a gratitude talk.

Ice Cream For Breakfast

A lot to get done... Eat some ice cream.

This week is super busy for me; my class has a big exam next week that I needed to write and make the review for, the family I tutor for added another night a week, House of Cards started back up, and my little Georgie has decided to wake up at 5 am every morning.
I'm finding myself working until midnight every night, and then having to wake up at five am, from a night's sleep that was interrupted at least once by a kid having to pee or needing a snuggle after a nightmare.
Last night I came home and had a headache. I took tylenol, and then kicked myself because it ruined my plan to take NyQuil and fall asleep with Kiki at 7:30. It turned out to not be an issue because I was able to fall asleep at 8 without sleep aid.
Someone once told me, "If you ever want something to get done, then ask the busiest person you know."
As I keep piling more stuff on my plate I am finding there is more to do. Last night, I took George pee at 3:45 in the morning, and after I put him back to bed, I laid awake for over an hour thinking about the kids needing to eat more green veggies, and how I will go about making this happen.
The night before I woke up from a dream that I was riding a roller coaster and my harness was not fastened securely, so I was holding on tight to make sure I didn't fly off. The roller coaster even went under water, and I held tight while submerged waiting to take a breath of air again.
Roller coasters are a usual stress dream I have, same with being on a crashing airplane, being a student in a class I forgot to attend all term and realizing I have a test that day, or I am on an elevator that shoots way up into the clouds and I'm getting nervous of the heights.
This makes me wonder what people dreamed about in times of stress before the industrial revolution, or commercial flight. I suppose they could dream their ox ran away, and they needed to plow the field, or a fire burned their house down, or their stocked larder flooded and months worth of food is ruined. Most of the scenarios I'm envisioning involve natural disaster.
During these times, when I feel the weight of a hefty to-do list, I usually rely on good food to provide comfort and stress relief. As a student I was convinced the best way to prepare for an exam was to eat a meatball sub, where studying came in second. This morning, as I'm writing tomorrow's powerpoint, I'm having ice cream with my coffee, and instead of feeling overwhelmed, I feel light and at ease, like an all around accomplished go-getter.  

After today my work load will decrease significantly for a couple weeks, so waking up throughout the night won't be as devastating since I won't follow up my kids' potty trips and nightmare snuggles with hours of thinking of more stuff to do. I will blissfully fall back to sleep and dream about wonderful things, like drinking coffee and eating ice cream or a warm meatball sub.

Tea Party

This afternoon we had a tea party. I noticed how much our tea parties resemble a group of thirsty teenagers who just got their hands on a bunch of booze.

We cheers almost every time we sip. Sometimes we cheers before and after a sip. George likes to shout, "Sip, now!"
Then we all do a quick cheers, and knock back a sip of mint tea. Hardly a few seconds pass before George insists on another group cheers-sip-cheers.
By the time our tea cups were running low on tea, the kids started getting rowdy with their cheers. I had to constantly remind them that they will break our most coveted sentimental souvenirs, our coffee cup collection, by smashing them together like were on our fifth hour at Oktoberfest.
When Kiki finished her cup, she wiped her lips with her forearm, burped loudly and said, "excuse me."
She peeled off her sun hat, and climbed out of her chair. She put her foot down, and said, "Were done here."
I wanted to relax some more, and keep drinking tea, but she wasn't going to allow it. "Get up, and wrap me and G into a burrito on my bed."
George pushed himself away from the table like he was springing off the wall of a lap pool. He ran into her room, and laid stiff on the comforter. She laid next to him, and we took on our new personas. I am Chips-And-Salsa, she is Carnitas and George is Beans.
"Wrap us up tight, Chips-And-Salsa. But do NOT cover Carnitas' or Beans' eyes," Kiki instructed.

Then I wrapped them up tight, with their eyes poking out of the comforter-tortilla, and pretended I was going to eat them for dinner.
A giant burrito is the best way to end a round of fast paced drinking, tea or otherwise.