Happy Birthday to Me

I'm 28. I'm almost as old as what my grandmother has claimed to be for the past 40-something years. I think I'm okay with that - not like I have a choice.

I resolve to lose weight. This is the first time I have made that a resolution, except when I was about 14 when I resolved to make my best effort to throw up after every meal I ate. After strenuous effort and absolutely no result, it was abandoned. This time it shall be different. I am buying my sister's 24 hour fitness membership for a month while she is in Europe. This one has a playground where your kids can play while you work out. I promise to go every day and work out at least one puddle of sweat. Hopefully, I can lose a couple of twenty pounds and be thin and gorgeous dahlings. We shall see.

I shall make one more resolution. I will utilize my time better. That is a tough one since I pretty much live in a dream world of my own creation filled with political speeches, winning the lottery, saving people from fires, the perfect body, and singing the best rendition of the national anthem ever.

Too Too Long

I wish I could write more often, but I am too busy wasting my time to do anything remotely creative. And it is sad, kind of, that I persist in the notion that my doodling (writing) is creative. I think I'm depressed. That has been my mantra for years, but this time it's weirder. I can't sleep at all except for a couple of hours right before I have to get up and go to work. I had one cup of coffee last week, just as a little pick-me-up, and a couple of hours later, I found myself with a full-blown panic attack.

I don't believe in panic attacks, even though I have had them pretty regularly. Kind of like masturbating. I had them (did it) without knowing exactly what they were (it was). Panic attacks, with the possible exception of childbirth, are just about the most painful things to experience. I first get dizzy, then I feel pin-pricks all over, then I want to have sex like a madman(woman), then I want to beat my head against a wall until it is a pulpy mess and I'm a happy idiot. This particular panic-attack was caffeine induced. I was completely aware that I had indeed gone crazy, but I couldn't help myself. I called my husband who was studying and couldn't talk, then my friend Benton, who, for some completely unknown reason, decided that he didn't mind me spewing forth political opinion at the speed of light for about two hours. When I finally came down, I was exhausted but still couldn't sleep. My husband, even amidst all his studying, finally noticed my agony and bought me some vitamin/herbal/hormonal stuff that he had heard good things about. It slowly seems to be doing the trick.

I feel frustrated. I don't know what I'm doing with my valuable time. It started slipping away just when life was good. Life is still good, but time is racing by. My First Daughter is going to school next year. I feel like her babyhood went by so fast that the great foundation I meant for her to have is not there. I have let her watch too much TV, I have not read all the books to her that I swore I would, I allowed her grandparents to spoil her to the point of preferring them over us, I've yelled at her when I was tired, I haven't insisted that she pick up her toys, I bribe her with cookies just to get dressed in the mornings, I let her younger sister get away with things because she is the baby, I haven't filled out her baby book or picture album, I stuck out my tongue at her once, and I sometimes let her get away with not eating her vegetables. I probably don't deserve her, but I love her for all of that and probably because of all of that. I love love love the way she frolics and inevitably trips on her own feet, I love the way she stutters when she's excited, I love the way she plays "Funny Face Laughing Game," I love the way she tells me that her hair is like chocolate, I love the way she pretends to give facials, I love how fastidious she is when choosing her clothes and the way she could care less about them 10 minutes after she puts them on, I love her little machine gun laugh, I love the way she curls up like a little snail when you tuck her in bed. I love the way she says cubby and chubby and tubby. I love the way she reads The Cat In The Hat to herself. I love the way she sleeps in bed with me without moving. I love it when she hugs her sister, I love it when she sounds like a little school-teacher, I love it when she says "I luff you, Mommy and puts her little arms around my neck. Basically I am in awe of my firstborn. She makes me feel completely inadequate and yet I love her so completely. The First Baby.

I Sprained My Tongue on Valentine's Day

No; I have not taken up punk songwriting. I really sprained my tongue. And not in the good way. It began a little over a year ago when my husband bought some frozen fish from a door-to-door salesman. Why did he do this? I don't know. Jethro does a lot of things that confuse me a little, but anyway, he bought it at a pretty good price considering that it hasn't poisoned us.

Anyhoo, among the plethora of frozen fish was a bag of frozen lobster tails. We had been saving these lobster tails for a special occasion, but each special occasion that has passed, we have forgotten about them. Well, yesterday, the happy coincidences of poverty, Jethro's board review, and the girls' ear infections forced us to reconsider our restaurant plans, and the bag of lobster tails, at long last, was utilized.

Jethro bought a cheap bottle of champagne and a single rose, and I got the kids to bed, broke out our wedding champagne glasses, and turned on War Stories with Oliver North. Tres romantique. We sat down Indian style at our coffee table to enjoy the lobster feast. We clinked our glasses and dug in.

The first lobster tail I ate was quite mushy which I attributed to some mild freezer burn. But the second one I ate was perfect. This got me thinking about that first one.

Now if you have ever gotten food poisoning, you know that there is a fate worse than death. You feel like you're in the bowels of hell with the bowels of hell. I reflected on this as I chewed my second lobster tail. I concluded upon swallowing that I would rather "release" the already consumed lobster tails rather than suffer the potential consequences. I felt bad about "releasing" the good one I had just eaten but what else could I do?

Now there is a reason that I am a little overweight. Part of it is the Bigboobs, part of it is a virulent hatred of exercise, and part of it is that I am an utter failure at bulimia. No matter, I never had quite this incentive before. It took a little while, but finally, after thinking very hard about MTV's Jackass, and with my finger reaching depths it had never reached before, I accomplished.

I returned to the lobster feast with my enthusiasm dampened somewhat. Jethro had considerately divided up the non-mushy lobster tails into equal portions. I had finished my portion and drank most of the rest of the champagne when I realized that, due to my expulsion attempts, my tongue was sprained way way way in the back where it attaches. Since I could do relatively little about it, I finished the champagne, reveled in my intoxication for about 10 minutes, and then went to bed. Quite possibly, it was my most memorable Valentine's Day.

Ramblin' Man (Woman)

Jethro and I have many things in common. Eating and drinking for one. We love it. Unfortunately, Jethro's metabolism is conducive to marathon eating sessions and mine, well... isn't. We both like gross-out comedies and violin solos, and we both enjoy the fact that we are (to put it delicately) of differing races. It gives us something to talk about.

I really have to compliment myself at how I was able to list our racial diversity as a similarity. I think that was the most brilliant politically correct statement I have ever made. So brilliant, in fact that I'm going to end on it.

The Super Bowl and the Nipple

Kinda sounds like a modern day Aesop's fable. I was blotto by the end of the first quarter so I gotta say that the old nippy didn't make much of an impression on me. This was also due to the fact that I was dancing in line for the port-o-lets at time. I have since seen replays.

Now from an adult perspective, I don't think it was any big deal. I mean if a woman like Ms. Jackson feels that it is a wise career move, or aesthetically pleasing, or in some way cathartic to have a dancing singing man-child rip off her top in front of billions of people, I would firstly have to seriously question what went on in her childhood. Secondly, I would have to admit that I am more amused than offended. I began singing another tune when I spoke to my little sisters though. One of them had a Super Bowl party with a few of her little girlfriends. They were really disturbed by it. It made me think about what I would have thought at that age (11 years). I think I would have been horrified. It wasn't so much the nudity, but the way in which the offending feature was exposed. It was a little scary. As an adult, I am about as intimidated by Justin Timerlake as I would be by a bowl of pudding. But as a little kid, I would have been frightened by any guy ripping off any gal's shirt. It also annoys me in a more abstract way, that any celebrity would be so egotistical as to think that their naked body parts could elicit any emotion at all in me or anyone else. But mostly, I think it was crummy to make kids see that.

Other than that, the Super Bowl was great. Despite what the idiot commercial reviewers say, I think it was the best one I've ever seen - except for the fact that I drunkenly changed my allegience to the Panthers at the last second. I always do that. I pick my team and then somewhere around the 4th beer or Long Island, I change my allegience to the underdog (if the underdog is not who I am rooting for in the first place). Weird, I know.

Maiwage. Maiwage is what bwings us togethew today.

I don't know where to begin about it. First off, I'll just start with the fact that I like being married far better than I ever thought I would. Before I was married, I saw it as a prison. And not only a prison that I would never want to be in, but also a prison that no one in their right mind would want to be in with me.

I was pretty content being on my own. A little familial support would have been appreciated, but aside from that it was nice not having to kiss anyone's ass. The fact that I could pack up and go anywhere once I had a few dollars in my pocket was very alluring. Plus, my mother, who I will always love regardless, did not exactly inspire dewy marital visions. Part of my antipathy towards marriage was due in part to ye olde self-esteem, but mostly it stemmed from not wanting to be even remotely like my mother. Honestly, my mom could turn Cinderella into a runaway bride.

Now that I have taken the plunge and am quite happily treading the marital waters, I have to say that it is a pretty desirable condition. I mean, we can have sex. And it is legal and moral by almost everyone's standards. I gotta say I'm down with that because I like sex, but could not handle the guilt of having it pre-maritally. I think my husband is a lucky man, but I also think I'm a lucky gal. But we made an agreement before we got married that we wouldn't use sex as a weapon. It was just off the table as far as arguments were concerned. We also agreed that we would not refer to each other as "soulmates." Talk about fucking pressure! I mean, who would do that to themselves? What happens when you have a fight? Are you suddenly not soulmates? I am quite hip to fact that I've never been terribly sentimental, but I think that the lovers of today put way too much pressure on themselves to ever make a marriage work. From the perfect proposal to the perfect house, the second something isn't perfect, the whole stack of cards goes crumbling down. Add to it the fact that most men pretend romance to get the girl, but sooner or later break under the strain, as well as the fact that women have decided that marriage and kids suck up their valuable Oprah-time/individuality/creativity, and you have one great cauldron of pointless emotional bile.

Anyway - to anyone who is married - don't sweat the small stuff.

Music

It would come as a surprise to anyone who knows me, but I don't like music very much. Very rarely do I hear a song and like it immediately. Rare exceptions have been La Bamba (movie version), Sleepy Jean (the Monkees), American Pie (Don Maclean), Sex and Candy (Marcy Playground), Dream On, Cryin', Pink, and Amazing (Aerosmith), Fancy (Reba McEntire {she had me at "the outskirts of New Orleans"}) and embarrassingly, I Touch Myself (the DiVynals) and Staycy's Mom (Fountains of Wayne {erg!!!!}). There are a few more, but it is hard to come up with them on short notice. With a minimum of analysis, one could easily come to the conclusion that I am more of a fan of melody and less of a fan of lyrics. "I Touch Myself" should draw you to that conclusion pretty quickly. The melody is what actually means something to me. Words mean little to me, even in poetry (again there are exceptions). However, some whiny pop star's pseudo-philiosophical non-poetry set to music is not my idea of a winning combo. However, if the music is good, or at least has a nice harmony, I can blissfully ignore the lyrics.

All my dislike of lyrics, however, does not mean that I spend hours in elevators.

Perhaps I don't have time to listen/study music as much as I would like, but I am reasonably sure that the gutter sludge I'm forced to hear between listening to news and traffic reports is not the best humanity has to offer.

Thoughts on the Holiday Season

Had myself a mellow little Christmas. At least it was mellow compared to Christmases past. I have eight sisters, so present buying was, as always, a chore. But it was fun. Next year though, I am buying everything online months in advance. While I would love to be a contributing factor in the annual Christmas boom, I am afraid the economy will have to do without my cash during the Christmas rush.

Probably only the liquor stores will see any honest-to-goodness Christmas patronage. With half of my sisters being of age and 2 more drinking anyway, a lot of booze goes a long way.

Now in my family, because there are so many of us, we do KKs or Secret Santas and exchange gifts. This means that someone inevitably gets the shaft. My sister, oh let's call her Winnie, seems to get it most often. The first year we did secret santas, she got a little box full of holy medals and necklace charms that had been sitting around in the bathroom drawers for years. The poor sister who gave it to her was too young to get herself to the mall and wouldn't have had much money if she did. She has been mercilessly teased and has overcompensated each Christmas since then. The sister who gave the holy medals that year got the shaft this year, receiving a M'Bop Hanson CD. I think she got something else too, but everyone will remember the CD.

My two daughters made out like bandits, not that they should have. Two naughtier children I have never seen. By the rules of naughty and nice, my kids should have received chains, switches and coal in their stockings, but somehow Santa forgave them and brought them dolls and games, a basketball hoop, a little karaoke machine, a Dora backpack, and a trumpet. Not that my kids wouldn't have had just as much fun with chains, coal and a switch. They are ridiculously easy to please. It almost takes the fun out of it for me. But it was cute to see them ripping open their presents with gusto and then fighting over them.

My husband is gyrating in front of me, wiggling his limpness, probably hoping I will do interesting things to it. It is strangely seductive in an Old Elvis kind of way. Think I'll go give it a shot. Sorry if I have offended, but this is my blog. Onward and Upward.

Hopefully with the Christmas season behind me, I will have a little more time to write. Merry Christmas, Happy Chanukka, Brightest of Solstices, Good Kwanza and a Jubilant Festivus (couresty of the Costanzas) to all.

Mr. Jackson

Now I swear this is true and I have friends from elementary school who can back me up. I never liked Michael Jackson. I secretly liked Beat It and Billy Jean, but I did not like him. I thought he was bizarre. Granted I was about 6 or 7 at the time. But while all of my little friends were buying MJ posters and excitedly discussing gloves, I stood firm in my dislike. I am not proud to be redeemed. Yeah yeah innocent until proven guilty. Fine. I still think he ain't right. What surprises me is that my husband, the gun lover, is surprisingly liberal in these matters. Not child molesting, but the innocent until proven guilty thing. He won't even make a judgement after the trial is over. The most I can ever get out of him is "based on the evidence that has been reported, he appears to be guilty." My husband is the type of person who would obey traffic laws if he were the only person left on the planet. I once talked him into running a completely deserted red light at about 3 am one morning. I can't tell you what a turn-on it was when he did, but then again, we had been sitting there for about 5 minutes. But I digress, or at least I think I do. I had a point somewhere around here. Oh yeah. There is, apparantly, a law in CA that allows you to bring in evidence of prior bad acts as long as they fit the MO of the crime you are being accused of. The evidence doesn't even have to be a conviction, just an accusation. Deep down, my conscience is pricked by this law. Don't get me wrong, I think it is horrible for a child molester to get off on a technicality, and the knee-jerk, civilly disobedient reactionary in me could embrace this law wholeheartedly, but there is still something odd about it. I think it has far too great a potential to be abused. But then again, so do kids. So there it is.

Observations on the upcoming holiday

Tomorrow is Halloween. It really is my favorite holiday. I would like to love Thanksgiving and Christmas best, but I think expectations are to high for both. No one expects too much out of Halloween so there is less pressure. Besides, you get to dress up. The best costume I ever saw was a female flasher. She was wearing a trench coat and tight fitting khaki pants. For the "flashing part" she had what appeared to be massive amounts of brown fuzz taped to her crotch. Every time she would fling open her coat, bits of fuzz would fly everywhere. My admiration was twofold: 1)It was damn funny. 2) Even though I pride myself on my originality and creativity, I am humbled every year by my failures in the costume department. For years now, I haven't varied much on the witch/corpse theme. I forced my children into fairy costumes with elf shoes for the past two years. Last year I thought I was going to be enchanting with my interpretation of Galadriel from Lord of the Rings, but when I got a good look at myself under the blacklight, you could only see my white bra shining like a lacey dual globed beacon. Needless to say, no one cared at all who I was supposed to be.

This year will be a little different. I have decided to embrace my mediocrity and be a vampire. I have decided to be a sexy vampire, combining the concepts of Interview, Underworld, and Lord of the Rings. Now Robin, I'll be wearing an ice blue strapless corset, black leather pants, black combat boots, a tight shiny black trenchcoat. I have tried the whole outfit on and I look stunning. Keep in mind that my use of the word is not necessarily meant to imply beautiful or sexy. I can't really make that judgement, but I am sure that it will not take a blacklight to get me some attention. My husband likes it and that's all that counts.

So What's New With Me

Jethro and I took our two girls to the Tex Ren Fest this past weekend. Besides blowing $200 hard earned dollars on what amounts to very little, we had a good time. My husband, being a generous person by nature, tipped the bar wench a dollar for getting his beer. The brazen hussy asked in that bizarre accent Americans take on at Ren Fairs if he wanted to place it in her coconuts! Now, the coconuts she was refering to were spilling copiously out from atop her extremely strained corset, so it would have been pretty easy to do and I doubt she would have felt a thing. My husband though, being a gentleman, decided to leave well enough alone. But I think he was a little excited.

I had an argument with my mother recently about this very issue. My mom is rather old school about things of a Ren Fair nature. She believes wholeheartedly that her husband should not be led into temptation and her kids shouldn't get exciting ideas, so the Ren Fest is out for her and anyone under her roof. I would agree with her, except for the fact that there wasn't much that was tempting at the ren fair, at least this year. I mean it is the same principle as nude beaches. Everyone you wouldn't mind seeing naked is covered, and the people that you least want to see starkers are flashing their celulite and pubes for everyone's pleasure.

One thing I did notice at the fair. Every thong wearing chain mail slut had at least two drunk men stalking her. I think my kids would take a lesson from the evidence right in front of their face. I don't think I would have found it exciting to have two unstable men lurching around after me when I was seventeen. Besides, everyone was laughing at them. Oh well. I never swore that I would be a good parent. My method of instilling morals in my children, at this point, seems to be poking fun at those whom I consider to be of low character. This includes TV evangelists as well as the chain mail sluts (lest anyone think I'm interpreting things too narrowly). But I think I have more sympathy for the chain mail girls. They're just trying to have a little fun and probably just haven't considered the fact that if they were (God forbid) to be involved in a rape situation, they would have a hard time proving their case. I think that is a rule for women to live by. "Never get involved in a situation where you couldn't prove rape." Girls from 13 on should be taught this. The scenarios can darken as they age. I'm gonna get off my high horse now and go to bed. It's 1:30 am for cryin' out loud.

HEAT WAVE

I decided to post my personal stuff on a blog devoted specifically to that purpose. If I start mixing politics with my sex life I could end up getting horny every time John Ashcroft moves his sexy lips. Since I'm too tired to write something new, I thought I would post an entry that I erased from the other blog. Here it is in all its glory:


I'm definitely disturbed tonight. The heat wave we've been having in Houston is insane. 105 degrees in the shade. The 100% humidity was what made it unbearable. You felt like you were swimming through the air and it was pressing down on your lungs like it wanted to smother you. Narnia and the North! Thankfully, it broke and the temp is about 73 degrees. I'm wearing a sweater. I know... how gay.

I have had a lot of sex lately. Maybe I secretly want another baby or maybe it is just the steamy southern nights. Anyway, I've never been affected by the heat this way, but I guess it's as good a way as any to pass the time.

My evening (last night): I came home from work around 9:00 pm. I waded through the air and went inside. My husband was studying for his finals and the kids were gone to their grandparents’ house. Even though the AC had been running all day, it was about 90 degrees inside. I went to the fridge. My husband had finished the last coke so I took out a cold beer. I put on a very light cotton nightgown - kind of like a long tank top. I cracked open that beer and drank it in about 2 gulps. One thing I learned in college is that nothing seems as physically painful if you're a little drunk, including the heat. I didn't even have the energy to turn on the TV. I just sat there drinking beer. After the third one I dozed off a little. I hadn't eaten all day, so they hit me kind of fast. Unless you live in the heat and drink beer, I can't begin to describe how good that feels.


Just as I was almost fully relaxed, I heard a book slam shut and my husband (I'll call him Jethro) came stalking out into the living room. "I can't concentrate." That was all he said. He pulled off my nightgown and we went at it. We were at it for quite a while. The heat was so enervating that it seemed like we were doing it underwater. We finally finished and went straight to bed. Lucky thing for Jethro that I'm not the cuddling type. It was an interesting screw. I'll leave it at that. Except for the fact that he came on to me, I felt like a man. "Drink a little beer, make a little love, go down for the night. Uh huh, Uh huh." We woke up at 4:00am (barely) and did it again. Neither of us said a word the whole night.

So now that I have entered this account of such a deeply personal and sexual nature and recorded it for posterity, I will close. Hope it was entertaining. Goodnight.