The Problem With E-Bay Names and Some Other Stuff September 29, 2009

If, for example (and this is purely hypothetical, of course) you have an e-bay name like Jesuspaidyourprice, and you send me something that involves about a hundred feet of Velcro strapping and the strapping is all jumbled up and stuck to itself and to the few parts of the item that aren’t Velcro, then I might find myself thinking something like “well He may have paid my price but He certainly didn’t pack my item because He would have made sure that it wasn’t a jumbled mess when it got to me (and He probably would have sent it in a timely manner especially after I sent Him a message about how I hadn’t slept in a week because my kid could get out of his crib and this item is supposed to be able to prevent that)”  (It works beautifully by the way.)

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My hair is currently about 8 different colors.  Most are the usual blondish reds, brownish blonds etc… but then there’s the hot pink.  It was intentional and I love it.

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I got an A on my first math test.

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I have a Chemistry test next week.  I’m a little nervous.

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The lady that charged way too much for shipping (and then assured me that it was actually going to cost her that much to ship my item) made $8.50 on the deal and then (probably because she had assured me that it would cost that much and felt guilty) refunded me $3.  Which is nice.  But at the same time I have to think “why even bother?

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Climbing is giving me really nice arms.  I find myself admiring them in the mirror while I brush my teeth and my hair.  (And, you know, when I happen to walk by a mirror and pull up my sleeve and flex.)  I’m no Michelle Obama yet, but I’m getting there.

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Why do small boys insist on accompanying everything they do with farty noises?

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I’m still slogging through Buffy but it feels a lot like slogging so I wonder why I even bother.  (I bother because I want to see “Once More With Feeling” and I don’t feel right skipping ahead.)  But we’re also now watching Angel which I quite enjoy.

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The End.

…With the Time and the Marching On September 1, 2009

It’s not that I don’t have anything to write about.  I actually have several fairly interesting ideas (that I will no doubt either forget or not find nearly as interesting if I don’t just write them already) I just find that I’m completely lacking in the desire to sit down and get them out.  And now I’ve got school and my new schedule and the guilt over spending so much time on school rather than doing things like taking care of the kids or cleaning the house and… I can come up with excuses all day.

What it really comes down to is that I’m not feeling it.  Haven’t been for a while as evidenced by the last month or two’s posts.  And I don’t have much to say about that.

The end.

Shout Out August 24, 2009

I’m posting this in honor of my husband who’s a long time Metallica fan.  And my cousin who is Mr. Tim.

And because I think it’s funny.

Happy Monday.

A Blog Post August 5, 2009

I keep thinking up these really great posts and I don’t understand why they’re not just appearing on my blog.

It’s getting to be a problem.  I want to post, I think up insightful and pointed things to write, such as my solutions to the healthcare crisis (make people pay for their healthcare) and the economy (work) or sometimes they’re witty, pithy little tid-bits such as… well, I can’t tell you any off hand.  But you’d better believe they were both witty and pithy!  But I find that I have a lot of trouble translating that into sitting down and typing lately.

It’s a problem.

So in lieu of pointed and insightful or witty and pithy, I give you… Ketchup.

The Princess and the Pea are both successfully back in school.  So far so good.

The Pea turns 7 today.  Holy Crow!

Tomorrow is my 11th anniversary.

I went and chatted with my academic advisor yesterday and all of my arguments were successful which means that I should be done with the prereqs by the end of the school year.  Of course, how soon I start the actual nursing program is anyone’s guess but, well, I’m encouraged.

I’m starving to death. (That’s not a “this is me lately” kind of a thing, more of a “this is me at this exact moment” kind of thing but wowie, zowie, I’m hungry!)

I’m thinking about going to the county fair this weekend.  I’ve never (to my knowledge) been to a county fair, it could be fun.  Right?

Sean went back to work last weekend.  I’m actually a little sad to see him go (I had no problem whatsoever with being the sole breadwinner in the house, aside from the fact that I don’t win enough bread to feed the whole family) but happy to see him able to go (and he likes to get out of the house on occasion so I guess that’s good).

The Infantile Delinquent would learn to read right now if one of his stinking parents would take the slightest bit of interest in helping him do so.  They probably won’t.

The End.

Ketchup July 8, 2009

You may or may not have noticed but the economy isn’t great.  People are losing jobs and taking pay cuts and losing benefits and just generally facing financial difficulties.  Well, we here in the Wonderland were feeling a little left out.  I mean Sean and I both still have jobs, heck, we were even saving a little money, but don’t worry about it, we found a way to join the rest of the country in financial trouble.

In the last 2 months Sean has had carpal tunnel surgery on both his wrists, first one and then a month later, the other.  Of course we didn’t realize until after the second surgery that because of some mix ups on his checks last September that were fixed but not fixed correctly, he’s not going to get paid for any of the time that he’s off recovering from surgery.  Let me tell you how excited I am to spend the next little while (and by little while I mean months probably) fighting with one of the biggest corporations in Utah (but don’t worry, they don’t hold a monopoly) over our money.  But I’m prepared.  I have spreadsheets.  It’s going to be a good time!

In other news- The Tour is on!!!!  I know that virtually none of you care even a little bit about pro cycling (except for you D) but I’m telling you, the tour de France is freaking awesome!  Viva le tour!

The Wonderlander’s are going camping this weekend, expect tales of outdoorsy hijinks to follow.

I’m supposed to meet Sue tonight.  I wonder if I should bring some kind of gift?  Isn’t that kind of standard when meeting blogging royalty?  I’m only meeting her because I know where’s she’s going to be and she can’t get away, really I duped her with promises to help her out while her daughter had surgery when in fact there’s not a lot I can do to help.  Hehehehe (said while wringing hands in a malicious manner) it’s all part of my plan to take over the world, one blogger at a time.

Speaking of bloggers, I saw Cheryl and Bythelbs, two of my favorite old blogger friends (that would be friends for a while not that they’re old) last week, it was delightful.  (I also met ShazBraz (who I would link you to but she’s private) and Tawnya who were also delightful.)

I’ve been doing a little work on the house as of late but nothing really worth mentioning.  And since I can’t find my camera I don’t have pictures.

Since we’re not moving afterall, I’ve decided to get some good families with good kids to move into my ward, and more specifically, onto my street.   That’s the item currently included in all Wonderfamily prayers and in permanent position as something to fast for.  It’s not going to be long now.

We took the Wonderkids to the Oquirrh mountain temple open house the other day.  They fought the entire time.  At one point I was threatening to beat them.   By the time we got to the sealing room towards the end of the tour and they gave the little spiel about how that was where families could be sealed together forever I was pretty sure that sounded like a threat rather than a blessing.

And now you’re all caught up.  How’s your summer going?

Howling at the Moon June 18, 2009

Was it a full moon last night?

I’m not really a superstitious person.  Part of me would like to be but it just doesn’t work out with enough consistency for me to really get behind it.  (Now if someone who broke a mirror really did have seven years of remarkably bad luck that would be a different story, but I’ve broken mirrors and I don’t think my luck is really much worse than the next gal’s.)  The full moon thing though, that may be a different story.  Really, most of the worst nights at work that I can remember were full moons, the very worst one was a full moon and Friday the 13th.  I’m not kidding.

Regardless, last night was crazy, absolutely insane, but when it finally calmed down (about 4am) and I got a chance to sit down and chat with some of my coworkers, Racheal, my nurse  every Wednesday night, and good friend, said, “I love working with Alison because the crazier it gets the happier she is.”  And you know what?  She was right.

I’m not be superstitious but I am a firm believer in the principle that when it comes down to laugh or cry, you might as well laugh. And up until last night I thought that that was about all there was to it, that was why I always find myself smiling and laughing and call the bad nights the “best night ever” but I realized last night when I was in the ICU getting ready to do life saving surgery, about ten minutes after helping do compressions on a different patient in the OR, that that wasn’t all there was to it, that this is why I do what I do.

Coming to work and taking out appendices all night is fine, it’s important work, it’s work that has to be done and it puts food in my kids’ mouths.  But it doesn’t really get the blood pumping.  Having everything the surgeon needs, even before he knows he needs it, on an elbow pinning is great, but it doesn’t leave you with the sense of accomplishment that having what the surgeon needs before he knows he needs it when cracking a chest does.

Sure, I love a quiet night.  I’ve mentioned before that every once in a while the stars align and I come in to work and do absolutely nothing for twelve hours, and I love that.  Don’t get me wrong I really love that.

But if I can’t do nothing, give me something to do, and make it a big one.

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P.S. Both patients lived and, last I heard, were doing very well.

Fetch! June 1, 2009

Are substitute curse words just as bad as real ones?

Sean says they are because it’s not like people don’t know what you mean when you say, “frickin’ fake curse words are so frackin’ stupid and you may as well just say the freakin’ real word.”

I disagree.  I figure that when you chose to use the substitute word you’re making a choice not to use the stronger word even though the stronger word is available to you.  So you’re choosing not to offend.  Or you’re choosing to tame it down some because you’re not that mad.  Or you’re choosing to use the substitute for some other reason.  But the fact remains that you’re choosing to use a word that is generally considered to be, at the least, less offensive than the alternatives.

Case in point:  I’ve never had much of a foul mouth.  I have plenty of other failings that’s just never really been one of mine.  Even in high school when most of my friends were dropping f-bombs right and left I just didn’t.  And then one day something happened (I have no memory of what) and I got mad.  Really really mad.  And I exploded and I dropped an f-bomb of my own.  And the whole room froze.  None of them had ever heard that kind of language from me, so when they did it actually meant something.  And I realized that when you use “angry language” all the time, it gets a lot harder to get your point across when you really are angry.  Gals like me can do it with a word.

Rantings, Ravings and Whatever Else Strikes My Fancy May 17, 2009

I tell ya, you take a mere two weeks off blogging and suddenly no one come to your blog anymore.  What is that?  Whatever, now I know who my real bloggy friends are.  They’re you!

So I was going to blog about the things you don’t have to try to know that you’re not going to like them but all I could come up with was doing the dishes for the first time in three or four days (stop judging me) and getting right down to the bottom of the sink near the drain and coming across a baby bottle (so you know it had whole milk in it because that’s what you give the baby) that’s still half full (probably it should be half empty here since this is kind of a negative thing but half full sounds, you know, fuller) and based on its position you know that it’s been in the sink since about ten minutes after you finished doing the dishes last time, you know, three or four days ago.  Do you really have to open the bottle to know you’re not going to like it?  Because I didn’t (have to open the bottle to know I wasn’t going to like it, not open the bottle.  I mean I did.  No, I didn’t like it,) I did open the bottle (it was going to have to be done sooner or later anyway) and I’m here to tell you , I didn’t like it.

Sure, I could come up with plenty more things you don’t have to do to know you won’t like.  How about, stepping on a slug in your bare feet? or cleaning puke out of your non air conditioned car in the middle of the summer? or hitting your finger with a hammer? or… but none of those is terribly original.  And that’s what I’m going for here folks, originality.  That’s what keeps ‘em coming back.  (Not that they are coming back, as previously mentioned but, whatever.)

But you know what really drives me crazy?  The stupid drive-in.  See, there’s a drive-in really close to my house and we love the drive-in and the kids love the drive-in.  So on Friday night we were going to take the kids to the drive-in.  So Sean got online to see what was playing.  It’s always a double feature at the drive-in.  And you know what was playing? Monsters vs. Aliens and Star Trek.  And we’re thinking  Awesome!  We can watch M v. A with the kids and then they’ll go to sleep and Sean and I can watch Star Trek.  It could almost be like a date!!

Too bad they were playing in the other order.   In fact there were two PG movies playing at the drive-in that night.  They were both the second feature.  So to the drive-in I say Pbbbbt!  You’re stupid and that’s twelve bucks you’re not going to get!

Despite the fact that I’m completely averse to all things out of doors, we’ve decided that the Wonderlands are going to camp.  (Vacations are freaking expensive!)

So after we realized that we were in fact not going to go to the drive-in on Friday which also happened to be after we had told the kids that we were going to go to the drive-in, we decided to make it up to them by camping in the living room.  I considered camping in the backyard but we don’t actually own any sleeping bags as of yet (actually, we own 5 sleeping bags, I bought them on Thursday night. But I didn’t want to pay for shipping so I don’t actualy have any sleeping bags as of yet.) so I went with living room.

So, Iwas on my way home from work and I was going to stop at Costco to get a tent (No, I didn’t have a tent either, it’s part of the story, stop interrupting.) because I had seen a Coleman 8 man tent on their website on Tuesday that I wanted to get and I had wondered, aloud, if it was only available online or if they had some in the store.  And on Wednesday night Jocelyn, one of the lovely women with whom I work, told me that she had been to Costco that very day (Wednesday) and she had not seen that particular tent but she had seen comparable, large, name brand tents in the store for nearly the same price.  So I stopped at Costco (it’s at the end of my street and apparently it’s not the one Jocelyn went to because) they had no comparable large tent.  The best they had was a 4 man tent.  I have four children, that makes six people in my family.  That was not going to do.

So now the kids get no drive-in and no living room camping and I am the best mom ever!!!

However, I did get an air mattress and some candy and Bedtime Stories (from the redbox) and strawberries and whipping cream and ice cream (can you say buying my children’s love?) and all was forgiven.

Whew, I’m all blogged out.

Do NOT Read This Post Out Loud April 16, 2009

my ovaries might hear you and start getting ideas.

Please feel free to refer back to this section of the post as often as needed. I’M NOT PREGNANT! I have a semi permanent implant that insures that I do not become so, and in addition to that, hormonal and -ahem- physical manifestations over the past 5 or 6 days have assured me that I’M NOT PREGNANT.

That being said, my back hurts.  A lot.  Like I can only just stand up kind of pain.  Liie, don’t even think about trying to lift your one year old kind of pain.

I’ve had this pain before.  It usually only last two or three days but, given how I started this post, can you guess when I had this back pain?

I had this pain once about two weeks before I found out I was pregnant with the Infantile Delinquent and again about eleven months after he was born.  (The InfaDel and the Baby are 19 months apart, you do the math.)  In fact, when I went to my (the Baby’s) first prenatal appointment, with my OB who’s a family practice doc and also happens to be the kids pediatrician, one week after being in his office for the InfaDel’s one year well check, and I had only just quit nursing (because I was pregnant) so my body had not (to put it delicately) restarted cycling with any regularity, he asked what had made me think that I even might be pregnant.  The answer was that I had two days of so horrible I couldn’t even walk, back pain.

So this time, well, I’m not worried (are you referring back to the top?) but if I were… well, between this and this and this it might be enough to make me contemplate suicide.  Or worse.

Abstinence.

I’m sure I’ll be fine.

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And seriously, please spare me all your “My friend had ans IUD and she got pregnant” and “my cousin had breakthrough bleeding for the first four months so she didn’t even know she was pregnant until the baby started moving” stories.  I don’t want to hear them.

This post was written solely for comedic affect, I do NOT, even a little teeny tiny bit, think that I’m pregnant.  At all.  No, really.

Somehow I’m Still Surprised April 14, 2009

After all I’ve been through with the Infantile Delinquent, you’d think that there wouldn’t be much he could do to catch me off guard anymore.  And yet, I still didn’t expect him to start the lawn mower by himself.

Someday I’ll learn.