The economy hits you right where it hurts... the tooth (fairy).

This morning, I heard the funniest story ever. Seriously, it is, I can't make this stuff up funny. I actually had to make sure it was true.

This little girl I know from the boy's kindergarten class got a dollar when she lost her first tooth. That's the going rate at my house, but this little girl doesn't live at my house. So, this six year old little girl looks at her dad, and says, "A dollar? The tooth fairy's a broke bitch." Swear. That's what he said she said. No foolin'. So he just looks at her and is like, "We're in a recession." I'm shaking my head because at this point, it's already the most ridiculous thing I've ever heard. But wait, there's more. When she lost her next tooth, the "Tooth Fairy" left her a fiver. She goes up to her dad and says, "She's getting better. Are we still in a recession?" Er. Mah. Gerd.

Through all of this, I'm thinking about the boy's experiences with the tooth fairy. The first time, she forgot... But she left a really nice note and a dollar the next day. And not just any dollar, a gold dollar coin because the boy was convinced that the tooth fairy brought gold coins. We may have been in a pirate phase. Regardless, it was an excuse for me to run around yelling, "Dubloons!"

When I was a kid, though, my grandma worked at a bank. My mom decided to capitalize on this by giving me foreign currency to perpetuate the whole tooth fairy travels the world nonsense. But what I wanted to know what what the eff was I supposed to do with two dollars from ARGENTINA?!?!?! All my friends are getting cold hard American currency and I'm over there like, I could buy a newspaper if I were in Argentina... I'm pretty sure I also scored some defunct German currency. So, if anybody's got a time machine and aspirations for world travel, I have some money you can use to buy a local paper.

And then my subconscious was all like, "BEARDS!!!"

I really like music, but only like classic rock and stuff. New music is debatably music... and scares me.

But last night, I crawled into bed, snuggled up with my pillow, and got my feet tucked under the covers for sufficient warmth...

 And I was singing ZZ Top.

WTF right? It always freaks me out when I do that. A completely random song will just pop in my head and I have a total "Beautiful Mind" moment. Like, "Whoa... was that just on tv or am I making crap up again? Balls..." I feel confident that ZZ Top was indeed not featured on Body of Proof or Hulu Plus last night... So, the only logical conclusion, besides the New Agey one, which BTdubs is awesome, is beard envy. I just can't grow a good one. At least not until I'm old and then I fear it will never be this awesome.

 

 

The New Agey conclusion is way more Matrix-y. It says basically that when a random song pops into your head, you'll probably have deja vu with it in a few days or something. And deja vu is your spirit or whatever remembering this part of your life path that you put together before you know, birth and stuff. I like it. I find it comforting. It's like tonight Bonnie Tyler is telling me, "It's okay, Ashley, you're supposed to be sad and snuggling with a baby moose pillow pet." I'm legit, peeps.

 



But back to the beards... There's this old guy living on base. The first time I saw this guy, I was in the car, driving down the road, duh, and on the sidewalk was hair. Nothing but hair. These beautiful graying blong locks blowing back behind this bicycler... As we got closer, I realized, Hippie had long hair and a matching beard... BOTH blowing in the wind... All I could do was scream, "BEARD!!!"

And if you don't get me everything I ask for, then you're just a nice old man like Mother says.

I don't like cleaning... or glitter.

Being a grown up sucks.

I mean you have to be... gulp... responsible, cook and clean, and take care of other people and like, keep them alive or some crap.
                                     

I mean, seriously, did life not get the memo that I'm probably lucky to be alive. Seriously. I have the delicately trained palate of a four year old. My friends are all like, "Ooo... I really want some sushi..." and I'm just like, "Dude. Fishsticks. Ahhh... with mac n cheese. Totes."

 

But I totally and completely utterly loathe cleaning. This should not be a surprise to anyone. Especially anyone who knew me as a teenager. I would seriously have so much clutter and crap in the back floorboard of my car that the only person who could ride back there was the girl with no legs. Hand to God, the total truth. And Hubs was such a trooper. Well, that was when he was Boyfriend, but poetaytoe, poetahtoe.

That really doesn't translate well to the written word, let's call it off. ;) So, he would try to clean out my car... and then it'd be back to that same shape a month later. So, really, he should have known what he was getting into.

Now we've been married for like nine-ish years and I haven't really changed that much, except that through therapy, I've realized...

So... I don't. A lot. But my kids still do. The buggers are like all up in my business being crazy, makin messes, and I'm like, "Who exactly do you think is gonna clean this up, scooter?" But the carry on with the paper shredding, and the toy throwing, and the glitter. The effing glitter. I hate glitter. I mean I love it... as a concept or thing not brought into my house. I used to love it in all it's beautiful facets... until The Girl found the glitter. See, I thought it would be a cute idea to make them an activity corner. It was until I got crap down, got too lazy and forgetful to put it up, and The Girl found glitter.

I finally got around to sweeping my house and I think I found enough glitter on my floor to sparkle up a whole club full of plus-sized strippers.

Pink is the new black... if you're colorblind.

Hubs is colorblind. When I first met him, he had an interesting exchange with my Asian friend.

Asian friend: If I wear a green shirt, can you still see me?

Hubs: I dunno, if I spin you around a lot, will I dis-Orient you?

Bahahaha!

So, anyway, we're at Hubs' office waiting on him to come back inside and we're talking about being colorblind. See, Hubs and his troops had a for real serious fifteen minute argument wherein he vehemently said their uniforms were gray, and his peeps disagreed.

His comeback? "I'm colorblind, why are YOU in this career field?" BAM! It's apparently one of the drop offs for those who are not... Mensa material. So we're in the shop and the Boy, totally out of nowhere, goes, "Once, when my dad was really colorblind, he bought pink shorts." I freaked out. I mean, it was hilarious, but I was all...

And the boy was just like whatevs...

So here's the story. Oh and it's a good one... Before we even had kids, we were visiting my dad and we went to the mall. Hubs went to Aeropostale while I went next door to Bath and Body Works. Apparently he can't stand the sheer concentrated scent of girl. So we come out with our respective bags of loot, yadda yadda yadda, we got home. I'm sitting with my dad and Hubs is out in the living room, and I thought, Oooo... I wonder what he got. I pulled out shirts and shirts and shorts... and I stopped. I looked around. I looked at the shorts. I looked around. I looked at the shorts. I guffawed. Yeah, a real live guffaw. It happened people. I look at my dad and ask him if he wants to see something funny and in true "my dad" fashion, he responds with, "Funny haha or funny queer?" I looked around. I looked at the shorts. I looked around, and said, "You know, I'm not sure." I held up these pink shorts. Pink. P. I. N. K. Pink. Not like flaming hipster pink, but a nice pastel pink for coloring his "eggs".  So I call out, "Hubs! C'mere!" He comes in wondering what the hubub is because now there is in fact, a hubub. It goes something like this...
Me: "Did you know these were pink?"
Hubs: "No they're not."
Me: "Yeah, they are."
Hubs: "Are you serious?"
Me and Dad: "Yeah..."
Hubs:

So he rode his lollerskates back to the roflhouse, er... went back to the mall to exchange them, and the lady asked what was wrong with them. He goes, "They're pink!" She says, I swear to glob, "Pink is the new black." OY!

Cut back to Hubs' shop and Airman eagerly awaiting the deets with a pen poised over a government issue yellow legal pad, and all I can say is, "Just tell him you heard pink is the new black."

Baby snailicide is bad and other things you find in Turkey

Right, so we live in Turkey. When we found out we were moving here, the girl was confused. It took a lot of  convincing to make her believe that we were not moving into Thanksgiving dinner. Anyway, we're here now.

The air gets in your lungs like mad. We just say we've got "Turkey". The Turkey is laughing at my poor sad little American OTC allergy medicine. "Bahaha, stupid American medication, you can't stop me!!!"

Then there's the tea. Cay. Pronounced Chai. Yeah. I love chai. I was so excited when we got here and everybody's going on about chai. And it's not that unreasonable. You hear about all of these spice markets and whatnot. I'm all like, "Whooo Chai!!!" Then I get a cup of tea and I'm like, "What's this malarkey?" It's Cay. Oy. Then I wonder why people drink hot tea in Turkey. I start to suspect psychosis. Then I had some... It was like Scooby Doo eating Scooby Snax.

What they don't really tell you is about the critters. We have these weird crows. I'm just going to say that a "murder" of crows started here. With these. They're like, zombie crows or something. But it's not all terrifying. We have hedgehogs. No squirrels, but hedgehogs. And snails... So many snails... When it rains, they come out everywhere. And they're always baby baby snails... All over the sidewalk. And every step you take...

Baby Snailicide...

Crappy Reviews of Movies Take 1: Hyde Park on Hudson

Started watching Hyde Park on Hudson. I'm in a period piece mood of late and picked this up on a whim. Honestly though, they had me at Bill Murray as Franklin Delano Roosevelt. I mean, how could you not? He's all putting the moves on his cousin with the cute hats.

Now the King and Queen of England are visiting, and I'm very much delighted to report that Olivia Colman is playing the lovely Queen Elizabeth II. She's angry because they're having a picnic and she hates picnics, and they're gonna have hot dogs and she hates hot dogs. She's clearly having a Terrible Horrible No Good Very Bad Day. lol I'm also digging Bertie's stammer. And bow tie.

Okay, so FDR was a hound dog. For real, broke Cute Hat's heart, but she made friends with Assistant, and all was well in the end. Liz and Bertie even ate hot dogs.

Overall, I loved the concept. It was actually a pretty good movie. Not amazing, but pretty good. Plus, it's Bill Murray as FDR.

Curse words-apotamus

I'm a writer. Writers like words. WTF right??? So anyway, words have power, but they also take away power. It's magic!!!

Demetri Martin is awesome. Like for real funny. He had this show on Comedy Central, and he was talking about the power of words. Like how if you add DJ to someone's name, they lose power. Example:

DJ Abraham Lincoln. 

 

Would you follow that fool's advice. Nah, you'd be all like, spin another track top hat, and he'd scratch up the Gettysburg Address or something. It's one of my favorite joke type things of all time.

So today, we're hanging out, the boy takes my seat. So, naturally I call him Jerkapotamus. You know, because what self respecting mother doesn't call her kid names. He goes, “Hey, I'm not a jerk.” I said, “I didn't say you were a jerk, I said jerkAPOTAMUS.” Which struck up a conversation between me and the hubs about making up words. You can add -apotamus to anything and it doesn't sound so bad. I suggested Hubs use it as a nice way to hate his coworkers with doucheapotamus.

I'm also a big fan of creating curse words. The Brits curse brilliantly! I love them. Sodding and cocking and bleeding. They're great! Though some of my favorites are homegrown, f***tard, f***sicles, assbutt. The list goes on and on.

But seeing as how I live in a house of tiny, people concentrate, I have to use word substitutions. I get my curse words from Orbit gum commercials... then turn them into door mats. What the french, toast?

 

Some I get from Adventure Time. Who the fluff are you? What the lump?

 

 

I've never used “smurf” though, which seems a shame because it has such potential. Smurfitty smurf smurfin' smurfapotamus!

 

 

S--- the Hubs Does

So, you know how I say stupid things? The hubs DOES dumb crap. I mean like shakin'-your-head-wondering-how-survival-of-the-fittest-let-us-stay dumb.

The guys in his shop actually want to make him into a meme. Yeah, it's that serious.

One day, we were taking a shower. Yeah together. No, don't get excited, we've been married almost nine years and have two kids, it's a time management thing. But Hubs turns to me and is all like, “So I forgot that I can't do stuff at work that I'd do at home.” I'm all like Omigod... smh what did he do? I, of course, knowing men, suggest scratching his balls or farting in front of the boss or something. No, no no no. This one was special. Like riding on the short bus special. This is what the hubs said:

“I tried to put my helmet on backward. Like with the reflectors in front like a mask... I didn't work. And I was standing in a big group of guys that are all staring at me like what the hell.”

So naturally when we got out of the shower, I tried it. I mean you have to do a double blind study to be totally sure of things. Turns out we're like the blind leading the blind because I'll be dipped if it totally didn't work. Bummer.

 

Goddammit

I have a friend, we'll call her No. 5. She thinks I'm hysterical. Not for my awesome sense of humor or the self deprecating way I make jokes. No, it's mostly because I fall on my arse and make a general idiot of myself. A lot. We've taken to calling these “Goddammit moments” because every time something happens, she shakes her head, laughs and says, “Goddammit”. If I ever actually made our life into a sitcom, it would have to be one for like HBO so it could be called Goddammit.

Like one day while I was sick. It's okay, I just had Turkey. I was talking and I had this hellacious cough and every time I coughed I peed a little. No 5 chose that particular moment to cough and pee for like the first time ever. I'm like, “Aw honey, don't worry about it, I've been peeing myself for weeks.” She's all “Goddammit” and starts laughing and then gets all flustered because she just peed and is laughing and peeing and it's just a hot mess.

But... perhaps the best Goddammit moment EVER was the time I picked out Halloween costumes for me and the hubs. We were gonna swashbucklin'est pirates this side of Tortuga.

 

 

 

Actually, it was the only thing we could find that fit all our criteria: pants, matching, and the right size. It is surprisingly difficult to find an adult women's Halloween costume with pants. But we did it. The buggers even came with hats! I love me a good hat. Especially as a pirate. But I was so excited that not only did we have costumes that matched, but I also knew where to get my hands on a freakin' sword! With costumes in hand, and flip flops on foot, I took off running toward the aisle with swords. A few things happened all at once, the slippery pant leg of one of the costumes dragged the floor, my foot fell on the fabric, and I was still running. I ate it. Hard. I busted my arse on the floor of the store, my flip flop flew down an aisle, and the hubs and No 5 were standing back laughing. It was epic. All my however many pounds fallin flat on the floor, shoe airborne toward the q-tips, amidst a cloud of laughter, and you guessed it, “Goddammit.”

Freakin' Kids

So I think I know how serial killers feel before they serial kill someone. I'm finding it harder and harder to control my urge to say wildly inappropriate yet true things to kids. I still have an inordinate amount of self-control, but it's waning.

It just gets harder and harder until one day you finally snap and there is no Santa Claus and there is no Easter Bunny and you're a dumb shit with an abusive dad! Then the cops are called, you have to move, social services is wondering why YOU have kids, and it's all just a big mess.

I hate kids. Mine are fine, but I don't like other people's. I mean it's fine and dandy to send home the kid who hits, but you should also be aware of the kid who's verbally abusing the neighborhood. In fact, I'm fairly certain my kids are about a month away from emo because of other kids.

It's a real shame you have to have kids to propagate the species, though there have been leaps and bounds in cloning, so there's something. Maybe someday we'll all be androids.

You know, when I was in the family way with my first little leech, I thought people who chose not to have children were like, crazy. I felt bad for them. The poor suckers were shorting themselves on the miracle of life. They were lesser beings. BAHHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!! I now call extreme BS on my former self. Bollocks. It's just straight up bollocks. Now, when I see those people I think, wow, what freedom and sanity you must have. I actually have friends who are like, “I think I want to have another kid.” I just yell, “NO!” and offer them a psychiatric eval. Because after all, we all know that the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over again and expecting a different result.

Discovering the limitations of the Homo Sapien

So here's the deal loyal subjects, I am but human. I know! I was as surprised as you are, but it seems there are definite limitations on the amount of amazing crap I can do at one time. Personally, I think this is bollocks, but it's also the way it is. It also seems that I come to this realization frequently.

When I had my first baby, I was reading all these parenting books and magazines and believed them when they said that you should never give your child Juicy Juice and hot dogs. It's like Pop Rocks and Coke apparently. But, I totally drank the Kool Aid. I was going to use adorable cloth diapers, I was going to only feed him organic produce, he would listen to Mozart, I would breast feed until, I dunno, kindergarten. Basically whatever the books said was best was what I was going to do.

To understand the severity of this situation, you must understand that I am banned from watching Ace of Cakes or HGTV. After a mere hour of learning through osmosis, I am ready to tear down my wall, build up half of it, dry wall it, lay some tile, do some lighting, re-grout tile, make a lovely water feature for the new patio area I'm gonna build, and bake a cake with freaking power tools. It never turns out well. I can build furniture out of a box, but it stops there. Otherwise...

So, back to the child rearing, it totally didn't happen like that. I cried constantly for a week and the kid is lucky to be alive. Screw you organic produce. I got happy pills and the boy got formula, and we all got over it.

Meanwhile, back at the ranch, I'm gonna homeschool my two kids who drive me crazy, I'm gonna not eat any processed food, I'm gonna cook everything from scratch, I'm gonna keep a durn tidy household, I'm gonna be vegan, I'm gonna make all my body care product from like baking soda and coconut oil, and I'm gonna be the bestest writer the world has ever seen.

Seriously, there is an amount of awesome one person can be and when you exceed that, it's like nuclear meltdown. I freakin Chernobyl'd myself this morning. That like one extra thing, one little teeny tiny thing flipped me out. Now, don't get me wrong, I'm not saying I'm not damned amazing, I'm just saying, I'm going to specialize my amazing.

It takes approximately 12000 hours at something to be considered an expert. I'm an expert at freaking out. Maybe if I were like some sort of super being, I'd be alright, but really, have you ever seen a well adjusted super hero? Have you? Me either.

Small but insulting rant about turns of phrase. You've been warned.

There are a couple of way-too-widely used phrases that drive me BANANAS!!! OMG, like for real.

The first one is "just sayin'". I find it ironic that people use this as a suffix to the conversation. I feel that it would be more effective to just say something like, "Hey Sally, I'm gonna be an a--hole, but your pants make your butt look like pancakes. It's not flattering." or perhaps even, "This is going to border on making you cry, but I think you're dumb as a box of rocks." Seriously. This is a PREfix people, warn your poor conversationees. It is NOT better to ask conversational forgiveness than permission. Savvy?

The last one is quite prevalent in the professional world. I mean I realize that imagination isn't running rampant through the cubicle laden halls of some of these places, but still, must we always "touch base"? Seriously? What the eff game are we playing? Is it tag because eff that, I'm not running anywhere but away from you. If it's some manner of ball, be it kick or base, that's just bollocks. I'm not dressed for that. So I can only conclude that this is in fact a Life on Mars situation and I am unwittingly part of a fraking lunar landing and have "touched base" on the effing moon. What does the moon have to do with my performance report? GAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!

That being said, lots of people I know and love have fallen victim to saying these exact things, so I guess I should add, I love you, but just sayin'.

Flash! ahhhh, he's a miracle.

Okay, hand to God, I just walked out into my hallway and saw a naked butt streaking by. I know what you're thinking, Ashley, you say, the girl is always flashin somebody. No. It was the boy!!! Freakin' okay, he used to be super... free. The kid would drop trou in the front yard and pee with such exuberance and flair that it was like my own personal Bellagio fountain. The sometime around Pre-K and like Eve eating an apple, he got all self-conscious. So now, NO ONE is allowed to see him in any form of naked. The boy even swims with a tshirt on. So, imagine my surprise when I turn the corner and see butt cheeks peeking out under a spiderman tshirt run into his room. My first reaction was "Crap, he had an accident." So I'm all going into crisis management mode. No, I walk to the bathroom and his pants and undies ARE on the floor in front of the toilet. Here was our exchange:

Me: "Whatcha doin' Bubba?"
Boy: "I hafta go potty."
Me: confused because he is definitely not currently next to the facilities "Are ya done?"
Boy: "Nope. Forgot my DS."


Sigh... He is his father's son. And all I could think of was "Don't look Ethel!"

Kids say the darndest things but I spout crap from my mouth hole

I have this bad habit of saying dumb crap to small people. It's actually really fun because they have no idea what a volcano sacrifice is or why Winston likes victory. It's nice to  mess with their heads in a funny way. I'm not saying turn them into the freakin Waterboy, but it doesn't hurt to screw with them a bit. Reminds me of the "Messin' with Sasquatch" commercials for beef jerky... I just compared my life to dried meat... <.< ... >.> ... <.< ... Oh well.

Some of my favorite gems are drunkenly calling the little girl not taking turns a Fascist. I mean, it made complete sense. Everyone was supposed to get an equal share of the rocket, hence communism, thus the kid that wants to take it all basically invade the line, is a Fascist. Made 40 proof sense to me.

I've also called my son Winston as in Churchill for being so excited about his victory over the orcs... He was playing XBox. I believe it was something like, "Simmer down Winston, It's a video game, not the free world."

Then there was the time I told my kid I didn't care if her friends were sacrificing themselves to volcano gods... She just wouldn't stop talking about this and that and this and this other thing, and momma you know what, she likes this and this and you know what she did she did blah blah blah blah blah blah blah and she yadda yadda yadda.

Currently though, I was walking with some kids with great hair and the fuzzy one just kinda out of nowhere mumbles at me and I'm like "You don't like water?" He's all "yeah." So I'm all, "Maybe you have rabies." FACEPALM smh.

Why I do things???

MacGuyver'd the crap out of that toy!

So, my crazy friends and I have the good intention of probably thinking about having a yard sale maybe. While creeping on the neighbor who was going though her outside storage shed, we happened upon the best treasure evah!!! One of those groovy vinyl kid tents with a frame made of like PVC pipe or something.

I freakin' love those things!!! When I was a kid, I used to waste away the hours in my barbie tent. That is, after I trudged down to the basement to find the box with hopefully all the pieces crammed in. I believe it was kept in the room with the plastic covered tree still strung with lights. That's right people, we were innovators. Before the prelit tree, there was my basement! It was a place of wonders. I once had to hide from a tornado down there, so I listened to an 8-track tape of Arlo Guthrie and pretended like I could live down there in the post apocalyptic terror that would surely occur after the tornado. I could live off of the home canned green beans that were covered in cobwebs in the other room and electrocute myself trying to bathe in the shower that we used to wash the dog in. At any rate, I love The Pickle Song. If you haven't heard it, check it out.

But back to this tent! My kids have a tent and this thing is most definitely in one of Dante's circles of Hell. I really need to read that... It's a castle. Cute right? I know, I thought so too. It has that weird memory wire frame thing since it's a circle and you just jab it with some poles and ta da! Construction! Yeah... not so much. I'm all up in this collapsed tent feeling like I'm going through one of those therapy things where you get re-birthed or something gross like that and the kids are mobbing me. They be all like, "Mama are you done?" "Mama, is it up yet?" Does it freakin' look like it's up. I've told you fifteen times that it's not ready. Did I give birth to Helen Freaking Keller? Geez!!! So I whip together one of the poles and then you have to jam it in this pocket at the top... that's currently on top of my head, line it up, put it in a pocket in the bottom and tie it to the side. It's totally easy. Except that the poles are a tight fit, they're bent to make the castle look uber legit, and my kids have barrel rolled the sucker so much that the nylon at the bottom has holes going all the way through it just for the poles. Isn't that special? AY! It's a flippin nightmare.

So you can see why I think this new/old tent is the bee's knees. Except that it doesn't have directions and I'm not really sure if all the pieces are there. It's cool, though, I got this! Through much laughing and wondering what the crap I'm doing and why the crap do I do things, I got the bugger assembled. Like a champ! What's up. Sorry, didn't mean to go all "street" on you there. It's only missing a couple of parts though. But that make it looks like the trailer park version of the castle from Beauty and the Beast cause that's what's on it. And now it's chillin' in my carport... all jacked up and ready to fill me with nostalgia at any given moment.

Under New Management

It has come to my attention that I am squandering the amazing privilege of having my voice broadcast to the masses via this blog. So, for the foreseeable future, I will be tweaking it a bit. Less newspaper article, more crap-that-comes-out-of-my-mouth. So what does this mean for you, dear reader? Well, it means it will be funnier. The content will have slightly less to do with children and more on random musings. It also means less consideration for feelings editing. There may be opinions that you don't agree with or content that makes you cry and wonder what nut house I escaped from. That's what makes it funny. I say the things that everyone thinks. And now, I'll write them also.