I’m a sick, twisted woman who for some perverse reason gets pleasure out of embarrassing my kids for no reason at all other than I think it’s funny. Personally, I see no problem with this except for the fact that my kids are pretty damn clever, quick witted and are giving me a run for my money.

D, a friend of mine, and I decided to take our kids to see Spider-Man 3 this past Saturday. His three children and mine match in age and gender, and are best buds with each other, so it made for a nice little outing. We arrived, purchased our tickets and got in the snack line for some popcorn, drinks and goodies to munch on during the movie.

While we were waiting for our turn in line I told all the kids to be deciding what they wanted so we would have enough time to get in the theater and find enough seats for everyone before it got too crowded. Since kids, especially our two younger girls, can take so damn long to decide when faced with so many delectable options, I shoved them up under the elbows of the crowd ahead of us so they could be looking and save us some time once it was our turn.. I’m such a smart cookie.

Well, it turned out they were not the hold up this time. It was me and my oldest son, because like I mentioned above.. I just really dig embarrassing my kids and the opportunity presented itself to embarrass my son, I just couldn’t pass it up. It also turned out to be a mistake.. all of it, the not passing it up part and thinking that could still one up my son damn it. I am so NOT a smart cookie.

Everyone was telling me what they wanted and I was placing the order, when my son said he wanted chocolate covered peanuts otherwise known as Goobers. Now being the the extremely immature soul that I am, I decided he should place his own order and tell the cute young girl behind the counter what he wanted, by its proper name. So I smiled and said.. “Sure honey.. tell her what you want.”

Knowing me all too well and completely having my number, he told the girl he wanted a box of chocolate covered peanuts and smirked at me. So I told the counter chick, “No, no, no.. don’t give them to him until he asks for them properly, by their correct name.” She gave me a huge smile that lit up her whole face and readily agreed.

My son laughingly tells her, “Don’t listen to my mom, she has a mental problem.” To which she replied, “She seems fine to me, now what did you want to order?” He sighs loudly and repeats that he wanted the chocolate covered peanuts. Of course there wasn’t anything in her counter “named” chocolate covered peanuts, she told him so and asked if he knew what the “real name” was so she could check again.

He, thinking I wouldn’t carry it so far to get the poor girl in trouble, told her, “If you don’t give me a box of chocolate covered peanuts, I may have to tell the manager you won’t take my order.” Meanwhile, D is thoroughly enjoying himself because I did the same thing to him several months ago. I’m pretty sure he was just happy it wasn’t directed at him this time.. plus he’s an easy going fellow who is just as warped as I am when it comes to gaining pleasure from humiliating our kids.

Anyway, the girl smiles and asks him, “Would you like me to get my manager for you?” He glances over at me, I grinned at him with a “whatcha gonna do now” grin, he looked back at the girl who was giving him his second “whatcha gonna do now” grin in the span of 3 seconds and said.. “Yep, I want you to get your manager.”

Well shit! D started laughing his ass off and gave me a “whatcha gonna do now grin”, the girl looked at me with a “You bitch! You are going to get me in trouble” look and walked over to some dude that looked like a damn linebacker for a professional football team, who I assumed was the manager. I elbowed D in the ribs as hard as I could to get his ass back in line and on my side.. it didn’t work, but I did get a satisfying ‘oomph!’ out of it, while my son, in a matter of fact manner told me.. “You’re going to be sorry.”

The manager and all of his bulk came over to see what the problem was. Very loudly, my son tells him and probably everyone else in a 20 block radius of the theater.. “My mother loves Goobers! She loves to suck on them real hard until there is nothing left but the nuts, then she chomps down on them and crushes the nuts between her teeth. Do you have any Goobers back there that she can suck on? She’ll pay you.”

Well crap! I very successfully lost round one, and missed practically the whole movie because I spent my time plotting out a way to get even with him. Having Goobers on my mind I thought okay, that’s what that vile mixture of peanut butter and jelly all in the same jar is called. What the hell Smuckers was thinking when they invented that shit and decided to call it Goober is beyond me.. but completely beside the point.

So on the way home I told D to stop by the little family owned store that’s located a few blocks from my house. Most of the people who work there on the weekends are students.. students my son goes to school with, which could possibly be a source of humiliation for him since getting even with him was now a must. I described the mixed nastiness to him, told him I couldn’t remember the name of it and sent him in to purchase a jar.. yeah a poor excuse for payback I know, but I had to do something.

He goes in and comes back out to the car shaking his head. We’re all laughing at my really lame attempt to get even, he hands me the bag holding my jar of Goober Grape and says.. “You just won’t ever learn will you? They were real busy in there and Mr. H was having to help on one of the registers. He rang me up.”

Oh shit.. Mr. H is the owner of the store. He’s a divorced man that hits on every woman that comes in the place.. he also lives one street over from us, knows of my separated martial status and has attempted on a couple of occasions to “hook up”. Let me just interject here.. EEWW!

“I told him you were addicted to Goobers and to ask you about it the next time he saw you.”

Round two.. successfully lost. I give up.

Note of apology to all the blogs I usually frequent… I have been somewhat out of commission for the past several days due to funeral proceedings for the teenage son of a friend of mine. Please don’t think I’m rude and have quit visiting all of you who are so kind to stop by, read my nonsense and comment. Thanks ya’ll.

59 Groovy Comments

I was in the dentist office the other day with the kids for yet another appointment of not knowing whether to spit or swallow. We were just sitting there waiting for our name to be called, thumbing through some magazines and playing a rambunctious game of rock, paper scissor, when in walks a lady with something in her hand.

This something, draped down from her hand, extended back behind her and she was tugging on it. So having my curiosity piqued and being the nosy bitch that I am, I kept on looking at her as she made her way in through the door. I wanted to know what the heck it was. It looked like a leash.. no make that two leashes.

Holy shit, I thought.. surely to God this woman was not bringing her dogs into the dentist office with her. Granted it was hot outside and it would have been inhumane to leave them in a locked up car.. but still, it’s a dentist office for Pete’s sake.. leave the beasts at home lady!

Finally, she works her way over into the waiting room, sits down and gives the command to “Sit”. Obediently they sat on the floor at her feet, giving me my first good look at them as she reached down and gave each of them a pat on the head for their good behavior. There is no other word to describe what went through my mind at that moment but appalled. I was appalled.

It wasn’t two dogs sitting at her feet getting a loving pat on the head, it was her two children who looked to be around 2 and 3 years old. She had her kids on leashes! Not out on a busy street, busy parking lot or busy shopping mall. She had her kids on leashes to walk through a parking lot that is on a relatively untraveled side road, a parking lot that holds maybe 10 cars and to wait in the serene surroundings of a professional business.

I’m sure some of you out there reading this may not see any problem with this, or perhaps you use or have used leashes on your children yourself. So let me just go ahead and say that I really don’t want to offend you, but.. OMG! I think you absolutely suck for doing that! That is a horribly degrading thing to do to your children. To have them on a leash! Like a dog! On. A. Leash. Like. A. Dog!

I sat there trying not to look at this woman and her dogs children, but it was like my eyes were drawn to them. They persisted in drifting back over in her direction. I kept hoping that once she got settled she would release them from captivity. Did she? Oh hell no she did not! Instead, she opens her purse, takes out a book and starts to read.

Then the office staff called her to the counter to fill out some forms. She got up, gave a couple of tugs on the leashes and the children got up to follow her. While she was digging in her wallet, one of them started drifting over to the side a little bit. Instead of simply telling the child to come back or reaching out to keep him from roaming off, she gave a hard yank on the leash that snapped him back to her side. I kept biting my tongue and repeating to myself.. “None of your business, keep your mouth shut. It’s none of your business!”

She completes the forms, sits back down, ties the leashes onto the frigging chair and continues where she left off in her book. One of the children tugged on her pants leg. She didn’t look at him or say anything, she just reached in her purse and pulled out what looked to be a baggie full of Cheerios. She scooped some out and held her hand down to the two children. I was expecting at any moment for them to bury their faces in her hand to gobble down their treat, or for her to make them play dead, roll over or perform some other kind of trick to get their reward, but thankfully they took them from her hand and quietly sat eating.

They looked so pitifully sad sitting there tethered to that chair. I had this inappropriate urge to set them free and tell them to run like the wind while they had the chance.. or scratch their bellies, get them a bowl of water.. something, anything.. I just felt so sorry for them.

I looked over at my kids whose eyes appeared to be as equally drawn to the scene as mine were. My oldest opened his mouth to say something.. to me, to her? I dunno. I put my finger over my mouth and shook my head no. Yes, I know, we were rude for staring, but it was virtually impossible to look away. My youngest son was looking her way too but whispering something to my 6 year old daughter who was staring at them as well. I was sure he was telling her to just be quiet about the whole appalling situation. I wanted to shout out in superiority, “Lookie there! I have mine trained too you old hag.. and without leashes!”

And just wouldn’t that have been embarrassing as hell had I yelled that out? Because right about then our name got called and we got up to make our way to the back of the office. I looked back to tell my daughter to come along with us and to my horror, there she was.. on all fours, in front of the woman and her children, pretending to be a dog. My oldest son started saying, “I was trying to tell you what he was telling her to do!” Meanwhile, I hear my daughter say, “Woof, woof! Can I have a Scooby Snack too? Woof!” HOLY SHIT!!!

Apparently, my dogs children need a little more training… or leashes. Pfft, screw the leashes, mine need muzzles.

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They say that the eyes are the window to the soul. I’ve always known what that meant in theory, but never had I thought about it in respect to someone whose eyes I was looking into. Last night I saw someone’s soul. It was shattered.

In the one moment that our eyes caught and held, I saw such a heartbroken emptiness. It was a look of wonderment, confusion and a loss so profound, that while standing still, I felt like something inside of me, something invisible, was being leeched from my body. My feelings, emotions, something spiritual maybe, I don’t know what it was. I’m not really sure if was being pulled from me like a magnetic force or if it was something I was extending. I do know it was something beyond my control, something that wasn’t mental.

Was it my sympathy I felt leaving me.. being offered where it belonged, my heart breaking for a broken heart, or was it a bit of my soul going to help mend the shattered one, the one that I can’t begin to fathom the depths of despair it must feel? I think it was all of that and not nearly enough.

I was looking into the eyes of a friend, a mother whose 13 year old son was in a car day before yesterday with two other teens. He was killed instantly when the driver of the car lost control and struck a tree.

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Hammer created a really cool meme that he tagged me for. Actually I got double tagged since I Eat Snowman Poop got me too. Yay me! That means I get to leave double long answers!

1. What is the stupidest mistake you have ever made with money?
We own a swimming pool/spa/outdoor furniture business. I left the bank night deposit bag that had over $15,000 (cash & checks) in it on the roof of my car, drove off and didn’t realize it until I got to the bank. Around $7,000 of it was cash and none of it was ever retrieved.

2. Do you think taxes are unfair or do you think it’s your civic duty?
Civic duty, however I don’t necessarily like how they are being used.. specifically in my community.

3. Do you take risks and possibly turn your life upside down for new opportunity?
I’m absolutely not a risk taker. I don’t like change period and prefer knowing what is around every corner.

4. Are you the alpha in your household? (Include pets)
Yes, I think I am, but sometimes I’m not too sure, lol. I have to forever watch my back for fear of being overthrown. Currently I have 3 underage people vying for my position of power.

5. Do you compromise with your significant other or does someone always get their way?
I compromise by letting him think I’m a bitch as long as I get to act like one. Is that what you mean?

6. What curse word do you use most often?
Holy hell and Holy shit.. I like my curses to be spiritual in nature.

7. Do you easily change your mind or are you dead set on most issues?
I’m dead set once I make my mind up on something. It’s the getting to that point I have problems with. I like to over-analyze and consider every possible scenario before I make up my mind on anything. Then, if I end up having to change my mind it ticks me off that I didn’t think of whatever it is I’m changing it to first.. you know before the person who convinced me to change it did.

8. What famous person would you like to trade places with for one week?
Whoever Sam Elliott is having sex with.

9. If you could go back in time and tell one person off, who would it be and what would you say?
My soon to be ex sister-in-law. I would tell her that her children’s best interest should come before her wants and desires, as well as her need to screw over their father, who worships the ground they walk on, at every available opportunity.

10. Were you a good student or did you do just enough to get by?
Both. I only did enough to get by, yet made really good grades and received a 4 year academic scholarship. Unfortunately, I hated school with an intense passion and only used two years of it before I decided to drop out and burn up a good portion of my braincells instead.

11. If you could give one piece of advice to someone just starting out on their own, what would you tell them?
Get one credit card to use only in case of an emergency and try like hell to never use it.

12. Are people basically good and honest or are most people opportunistic and predatory?
I think most people are basically good and honest, but they definitely watch out for their own best interest first, regardless of who gets hurt or stepped on in the process. Consideration for others seems to be more at their convenience opposed to their primary nature. I can’t think of those people as opportunistic or predatory though, because I think it’s how today’s society has molded most people to behave.

13. Is there somebody you wish you could go back and apologize to?
Yes, a really sweet boy I went to high school with that liked me a lot. I was never really mean to him, but did try to avoid him and I could have very easily been a whole hell of a lot nicer to him. Our senior year he was killed in a car wreck.

I tag Not Fearing Change, Chedwick at Tangled Up In L’Heure Bleue, Sayre Smiles, Limpy99 at I Have a Bomb Shelter And You Can’t Use It and Jeff at Psychosomatic Wit.

If ya’ll do it, be sure to add a link to Hammer’s site so people will know where it came from… http://whenyouronlytoolisahammer.blogspot.com/

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A lot of you may have seen this before, I know I have. But it’s cute and it reminds me of a friend of mine.. such a silly man. He likes to hide from certain people online.. he’s just not real good at it.

Anyway, for those of you who haven’t seen it before…

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