I've Got Four Minutes

I took Monday off work because the kids are on spring break this week, and I wanted to sit around in flannel pj's, drink Starbucks, and put together a 750-piece puzzle with the kidlets, which we did in four hours.  We are totally hardcore when it comes to our puzzles.  Oldest Daughter DJ'ed so I could hear her latest musical offerings (she currently has a huge crush on The Fray), The Son showed us some breakdancing moves, and Youngest Daughter made a mixture of Dots, Sour Patch Kids, Gummy Life Savers and Twizzlers for our snacking pleasure.  It was so awesome that I missed my days of being a relatively unemployed freelance writer, hanging out at home with George the Superpet and the kidlets. 

*sigh*

However, the lure of hooking pulls me back, and Current Husband took the chilluns to the Wisconsin Dells.  I texted him today to ask if he was having any luck hitting on single moms in bikinis, and he replied "Beluga whale in a seal colony", which is untrue but made me laugh.  He's a funny one, that CH.  I stayed home because the Hooker job only allows me 10 vacation days a year, and I've used two, and CH and I are going to see The Black Keys over Fourth of July weekend (YAHOO!!!) and that will take two vacay days, and with my six remaining days we want to do a couple of trips with the kids this summer.  I only have four (FOUR!!) summers left with my oldest at home, so it's quantity time with a nice dose of quality.

Did you read between the lines here?  I am home.  ALONE, save for George the Superpet, who is really good at cuddling.  I am so rarely home alone.  Last night after work, I met a very dear friend whom I haven't seen in a while, and we had deliciously cold white wine and some spicy basil chicken noodles at a Thai restaurant.  Outstanding.  Tonight, I am meeting another very dear friend to have a facial and a pedicure with a gift card I've been carrying around, and then we are going out for a margarita!  Whoo-hoo!  Then I go home to cuddle with George the Superpet.  Tomorrow night I am staying home and cleaning and going through things of the kids' while they are gone, hello Goodwill, and then they are home late. 
I miss my lovely family, of course, but HELLO!

Sheer. Bliss.

Nothing like a few days of decadent fun to recharge your batteries.  So take a little time for yourself, Wifers, if you can.  It's spring!  Time to bloom.

Have a terrific week, I'm raising a muy delicioso margarita in your honor tonight!

It's Whoreticulture Friday! Daylight Savings Time Edition

Whoreticulture: The industry and science of whores and whore-related topics. Whoreticulturists work and conduct research in the disciplines of OB-GYNery, Brazilian waxers and shavers, adultery, personal hygiene mavens and easy women. The word is composite, from two words, whore, from Greek meaning "harlot" or "dear", and the word "culture". Like NPR's Science Friday, Whoreticulture Friday exists to educate and spark discussion on the science of Whorology. Whoreticulture Friday is not for children. Or squeamish people. Or Mother-In-Laws. Or people I work with. Or neighbors who are raising feral cats. Or the people who read this post last year.


Today's topic: Real Housewives

I'm a bad blogger.  I recognize this, and according to AA, admitting I have a problem is the first step to recovery.  However, Charlie Sheen followed the AA program, so apparently I'm still 14 steps away from declaring I am a warlock with tiger blood, so that's a relief.  (BEING Charlie Sheen would give me topics for Whoreticulture Friday for the rest of the year. Sex with the goddesses?  VD from the goddesses?  Denise Richards? HEIDI FLEISS!?!?)  Anyway, after extensive traveling the last two weekends I sort of went into blogger meltdown and haven't done much writing-wise.  I'm sure you hardly noticed, but still.  Apologies.

Since it is Daylight Savings Time, I'm going to spring back to Friday and pretend this post is still on time.

I'm not a Real Housewives watcher.  Honestly, I'm not much of a reality TV watcher because I tend to get so frustrated with or embarrassed for the people on the shows that I just can't take it.  Project Runway is my only exception, mostly because the show is more about the talent than the personalities.  Besides, I think, "those people are just the Hollywood types who are trying for their 15 minutes of fame".  Then I went out for margaritas with a friend last Thursday and realized they are REAL.

These women are conservative compared to what I saw Thursday. 

My friend and I went to Los Agaves, a Mexican chain restaurant in the Quad Cities, for a few overdue margaritas.  We're mid conversation when suddenly my friend stops talking and her jaw drops.  She says "Behind you. Look behind you and tell me you see what I see."  I turned, and there they were.  The Real Housewives of the Quad Cities.  Women in crotch-skimming hemlines, six-inch heels, makeup by Tammy Faye Bakker, and hair-up-to-there.  There were about eight women.  The youngest could get away with saying they were Jersey Shore castmates, and they inspire second looks and gawking.  The oldest was a woman who had to be in her 50's, tottering on her skyscraper heels, lycra skirt, and was just...sad. 

I'm not saying you can't wear whatever you want.  Really.  Do it.  But if you don't want the entire Hispanic wait staff at Los Agaves to stand around the corner, pointing and saying things in Spanish about your coochie, follow these pointers:

1. If you feel all breezy in the vajayjay, your skirt is too short.
2. If you have on more makeup than Zsa Zsa Gabor, don't act surprised when people look for the other 13 clowns to get out of the Volkswagen after you.
3. If your 'do is tickling the top of a room with over 7 foot ceilings, it is too high.  And you are probably a fire hazard.
4. If you are showing over 75% lean breast, you might end up in a sandwich.  And not a delicious one.  Slathered in mayo...if you catch my drift.  And maybe you like mayo, and that's okay, but that particular mayo is NOT going to be back to condiment your next sandwich.
5. If the entire staff of a Mexican restaurant is catcalling at you, it might be time to wrap a tortilla around your burrito.
6. If your grandchild is texting you during your second Blow Job shot, it's time to go home.

We were two thirds of the way through a pitcher, and my friend needed to visit the ladies' room.  Two of the Hoochie Mamas had just headed that way, and my friend couldn't resist the opportunity to see what they were talking about.  After she left, the two women in the painted-on dresses walked by, and my friend came back disappointed.

"They didn't talk about anything, one of them left the toilet unflushed and the other one took a dump.  Total waste of my time."  Hmm.  Not something they cover on Real Housewives.  I can totally see why.

Happy Daylight Savings Time!  Have a great week!

Monday Minivan Media

Picture yourself in the front seat of my Venture minivan. (Oh yes. You're already green with envy over my life of obvious excess.) We both have a grande skinny vanilla latte, and we have a little time to kill. We could be waiting for our kids, or for our meth dealer to show up. No matter. We're here, in the van, together. Let's talk pop culture. I promise to give you a 1000 word review where less than 10% is actually about the topic. It's like having an actual conversation with me.


Today's musical: Mamma Mia

I think I've figured out the smell from last Friday.  George the Superpet is extremely shaggy, because I don't get him groomed in the winter because I feel all guilty taking away his coat.  It's like saying to your cute, defenseless kindergartner, "Hey, I know you have this really awesomely warm sheepskin coat, but since it's about 10 degrees outside, I'm going to make you go outside in just a tank top and pee in the yard."  So George still has his very thick sheepskin/poodle coat on, but it's been thawing, and even though I picked up five grocery bags of poodle poop the other day, the dog still poops every day, and he has apparently been acting as a large Poodle Swiffer in my backyard, collecting mud, bracken, and the remains of the 30 or so feral cats from the backyard in his shagginess.  He's been banned from my bed, which makes him very upset, and I'm calling a groomer tomorrow.  He weighed in at 111.2 pounds at the vet last week, but I bet 10 pounds of it is his coat.  Poor George.

So last Saturday, I loaded up the girls and drove to Omaha, Nebraska.  It's a five hour drive from my house, and until Des Moines it's okay, but the stretch between DSM and Omaha is enough to make you want to drive straight off of a cliff.  If there were any cliffs between Des Moines and Omaha, which there are not.  It's very flat and devoid of much, so even if you wanted to drive into something, you couldn't.  It's especially awesome when your 7-year-old says, "How much longer, I can't take it any more" about every 15 minutes.  You can't even bribe the children because it is the longest stretch in the world without a McDonalds.

I grew up in Nebraska, and live in Iowa, so I can say mean things about them because it is said with love in my heart.  It's kind of like how I can say, "It drives me nuts how my husband can just sit on the couch all night and watch TV" but if you say, "Doesn't it drive you nuts how your husband sits on the couch all night and watches TV" I will be forced to say, "No, I encourage it.  It keeps him from screwing the neighbor like yours does."  This is how I am about Iowa and Nebraska.  If you say, "It's so boring to drive there" I will say something like, "It's beautiful in its sparseness - ever hear of Willa Cather?  Try driving through Kansas."

We got to my parent's house, which is actually just a summer cabin on the Elkhorn River, and of course, my mom wasn't there.  She was shopping with my sister, which is where she usually is when I show up.  This time, they were shopping for three queen-size inflatable mattresses, because my sister's house was full of natural gas as their furnace broke.  Oh, and I was on Day 2 of my period.  If only we had a leper and a whore and this story would take on Biblical proportions.

My mom was taking Oldest Daughter, my sister, and me to Mamma Mia at the Orpheum Theater in Omaha for OD's birthday.  We sat around talking until we realized with a panic that we were late, we raced to the restaurant only to find that the wait was too long and we ended up at Panera Bread to eat fast before the show.  Mom had accidentally deleted the tickets from her e-mail, so we had to drop her off for the Will Call window at the front of the theater.  We dropped her off for the tickets, found a parking garage a couple of blocks away, prayed for a crime-free night and settled in for the show.

She is not in ABBA, nor is she a Mamma, and it is not set in Italy.

She is laughing at us, not with us.

Mamma Mia was terrific, with two notable exceptions:  A) the girl playing Sophie was very ANIMATED and THEATRICAL to the point of distraction, and B) Colin Firth was notably absent from the role of Harry.  I moaned loudly about the lack of Firthiness in the show, and during intermission my mom very loudly told us all a story about the last time she was in the Orpheum Theater: 

"Suzanne from work and I came here to see a movie, it must have been about 30 years ago or so, and I looked across the aisle and there was this guy jacking off, and it was the only time I've ever seen someone do that in public.  He was REALLY into it.  But the Orpheum has really changed since then, it's so much nicer."

You're welcome, everyone in Loge seating section 2.

Inside the Orpheum Theater,

where no one masturbates anymore.

So the show ended and we drove home and mom wanted to know why everyone was going to bed?  Aren't you going to stay up and have a drink?  Um, Mom, it's 1 a.m., and I have to drive five hours tomorrow.  Stay up with me, I never see you.  Okay.  So I stay up with Mom and have a drink, and when I just can't stay up any longer I crawl into the air mattress and promptly roll into the middle with OD  because the mattress is already deflating, and it's freezing cold in there, and just as I get warm one of the kids gets sick.  All of the adults get up to sit with the sick child, and when that seems to be okay, we all go back to bed around 2:30 or so.  Then I wake up in a panic at 4 a.m. because it's almost dawn of Day 3 of my period and sometimes there is an emergency.  I woke up at 8 a.m. with the same kind of emergency, and at that point mom was up with coffee having her morning smoke, so I decided to stay up with her and eat chocolate cookies for breakfast.  Because we are ALL about health in my family.

At 11 a.m. I packed up the girls and we left, just in time to hit a small snowstorm in Des Moines, and then Youngest Daughter got carsick in Williamsburg and then in West Branch, so I'd like to take this opportunity to say Thank You to McDonalds for having the cleanest restrooms on the Interstate. 

All told, it was nice to see my family, and we loved Mamma Mia.  But Sophia can tone it down a little bit.  And the Orpheum Theater is lovely, even though Colin Firth would have certainly perked everyone up a bit.  The end.

It's Whoreticulture Friday! Issue 58

Whoreticulture: The industry and science of whores and whore-related topics. Whoreticulturists work and conduct research in the disciplines of OB-GYNery, Brazilian waxers and shavers, adultery, personal hygiene mavens and easy women. The word is composite, from two words, whore, from Greek meaning "harlot" or "dear", and the word "culture". Like NPR's Science Friday, Whoreticulture Friday exists to educate and spark discussion on the science of Whorology. Whoreticulture Friday is not for children. Or squeamish people. Or Mother-In-Laws. Or people I work with. Or neighbors who are raising feral cats. Or the people who read this post last year.


Today's topic: Swinging.

Have you ever walked into your house and said, "Something in here smells".  Maybe no one else smells it, maybe they do, but it starts bugging you so much that you start exploring the house looking for the smell.  Tonight, my house smells like George the Superpet needs a gland expressed, or he is just waaaayyy overdue to be groomed, but I almost can't think about anything else.  It's making me crazy.  Just so you know I'm a little distracted by butt smell as I'm writing this.

I can't believe I haven't posted a Whoreticulture Friday since February 10.  I owe you all an apology.  I think it's because I took a vow of celibacy in Calcutta on Feb. 7 and it interferes with my sexual thinking.  So screw that.  Lately I've been on the listening end of some steamy gossip and it's time to chat.

Current Husband and I have lived in five different communities in the time we've been together, and lately, all I hear about is swinging everywhere we've lived.  At Urban Dictionary, the go-to source for information on Whoreticulture Friday, swinging is defined as:

A lifestyle of non-monogany where sexual relations occur outside the established couple. Swingers tend to refrain from romantic attachments with their outside partners, thus differentiating themselves from PolyAmorists. There is some overlap between the two communities, though the closeness of the comparisons are generally not acknowledged. 


This sort of freaked me out because it was so serious.  Most entries on Urban Dictionary say things like "the act of slapping a woman in the face with one's limp penis".  I grew up in the Seventies, and let me tell you, there was some swinging going on in my parents' circle of friends.  I remember a LOT of drinking, Kenny Rogers on the 8-track, disco lessons, and Wally Wilson in his tighty whiteys and nothing else, beer gut hanging out, saying "Who's the lucky woman who gets some of THIS!?!?"  My sister and I were supposed to be sleeping, but who can sleep with The Hustle blaring until 2 a.m.?  We'd sneak out of our rooms and peek over the balcony to watch the drunk adults.  Fun.  But I thought all of that sexual craziness ended with the 80's, cocaine and AIDS.  Not so.  MSNBC estimates that 2-10% of all current married couples swing.


It turns out that I must be some doily-crocheting-granny, because I think about 20% of the people I know apparently do some kind of swinging.  I've been finding out about ALL KINDS of swinging going on in different groups we've run with in different towns we've lived in.  Women flying to other cities to meet strange men they've met on the Internet for sex.  Couples having sex with partners other than their spouses in ...eww.. port-a-potties. Hubby on hubby and wife on wife, menage a tois, swapping, you name it.  ALL OF THESE ARE ACTUAL INCIDENTS THAT HAVE HAPPENED WITH PEOPLE I KNOW.  Normal people.  Who have lots of sex. With other partners.


Part of me feels relieved that I don't know about any of it, because frankly, I'm not interested.  I have enough problems.  And I have a phobia of other people's bodily fluids.  But part of me is a little insulted, like, Oh, so NONE of you wants to have sex with me?  Thanks for nothing, you discriminating little hump bunnies.  Because I have got it going ON, and you don't even know what you're missing.  I'm more flexible than I look, and just because I have to occasionally pluck hairs off my stomach and I have the double chin of someone twice my age does not mean I can't knead you like a loaf of bread.  But don't ask CH because I think he wishes the bakery was open more often lately.  Yours are the only buns I want, baby.


I don't judge the swingers - if both spouses are willing, it isn't cheating, but remember, the walls won't talk but everyone else at the party will.  CH is all the man I can handle (take me to bed now, Goose, or lose me forever!), and really?  You know you aren't going to end up with Gavin Rossdale, you are definitely going to end up with Wally Wilson in his tighty whiteys, and that is sort of a fantasy killer.  Seriously, who has the time or energy for this?


Do you think the MSNBC stat is on the money or way off base?  I'm dying to know, America.  Remember, it's in the name of science.  But there is such a thing as Too Much Information, and that's MY job, so keep it vague.


Happy Whoreticulture Friday, and have a great weekend!

Happy Birthday Oldest Daughter!

Well folks, this is going to be a quickie, but now that I'm a bona fide hooker, that's how they do it in my profession, if you know what I mean.  Actually, the type of hooker I am tends to do it very slowly and meticulously, and with strands of high quality wool and a hook, so I guess you get what you pay for.

Anyhoo....

Today is Oldest Daughter's 14th birthday, and I'm DYING over here!  All of a sudden I have four summers left with her, and frankly that scares the bejesus out of me just a little bit.  We've done pretty well over the past 14 years, Current Husband and I, but we still have four years left to really screw things up.  Lord, hear our prayer.

Here is the first baby I ever birthed:

Cute, no?  Just a few days home from the hospital.

I had no frigging clue what to do with this baby.  They handed her to me at the hospital and I thought, "Man, they will give ANYONE babies to take home with them, won't they?"  At least before you get a driver's license they make you do a driving test.  Shouldn't you be forced to try out raising a baby for a few days with an instructor sitting in, clipboard in hand?  I have many stories of that time, but OD has forced me to agree not to share any of them.

Here she is now, cello player extraordinaire:

Dang.  I really love that kid.  Even when she's all up with

the teen attitude, but don't tell her I said that.

So when OD was about 6, I was pregnant with Youngest Daughter.  OD and The Son asked about babies and how they come out, and I gave them a rough idea of what was going to happen.  At that point, OD decided that she would not bear children.  If she was going to have children, she would adopt.  And she would have a job first.  If anyone asked her anything about getting married or having babies, she would tell people, "I won't do that stuff until after I'm 25 and I have a good job."  Tonight, OD sent this link to me, which could be her:


So Happy Birthday, My Dear Oldest Daughter.  I hope it was as terrific as you are.

On a side note, I had another odd gas station experience tonight.  I had to prepay because my debit card got bent and it won't work in machines anymore.  I went into the station, and it was empty, so I grabbed a water and some cough drops and stood at the counter to wait.  This fabulous guy walks in with glittery star earrings, a star necklace, and gold glitter nails, apologizes for making me wait, and then says, I kid you not: "You have fantastic hair.  Love it.  I'm going to give you a discount on your gas." Then he hit a few buttons, and I saved .44 on my $30 gas purchase. I was stunned.  My hair apparently kicked so much ass today that it saved me about 1.5% on gasoline.  What gas crisis? 

May your day be full of happy randomness!