Today is Not an Awesome Day, Part 2

Imagine this is a kitchen sink

You might have read on my Facebook that our littlest puppy, Kujo, escaped out of our backyard the other day & proceeded to gorge himself on bacon grease that the genius Meat Man so kindly dumped over the fence. I realized this when I discovered a greasy beard on him & then I washed him in the kitchen sink, which is always boatloads of fun. While I was drying him off (fortunately on the tile floor), he puked up like a cup of straight grease. My other 2 dogs seemed to think they'd hit the jackpot & my son was all flappity-flapping his hands & jumping up & down, screeching, "EWWWWWWWW, MAMA! GROSSSSSSS!!!! THAT'S NASTY!!!!" So the obvious thing to do was throw the puppy outside while I yelled at the other 2 dogs, busted out the grease-cutter & paper towels, & cleaned up. Right? Um, no, not quite.

Except that it was pretty cold outside & Kujo was wet. So, off I went to fish him out from under the porch & put him in the kennel while I used Google to scare myself to death figure out what to do next. There were some helpful links on there, but there was also a lot of links that said eating that much bacon grease could lead to pancreatitis, muscle tremors, & death. I'm freaking out & feeding him bread soaked in hydrogen peroxide like Google told me to, wondering whether he's shaking from all the vomiting, from the cold & wet thing, or because he's dying. I call up my mom's vet & ask the vet tech what I should do, other than what I've already done. She says the vet's out of the office on Wednesdays, but she'll text him & call me back ASAP. 

Why, yes. I am having one of those
days, too.

Meanwhile, Kujo is in the kennel yelping his head off & the Little Tyrant is "barking" along with him (for those of you who haven't had the pleasure of hearing it, his "bark" is actually a supersonic ear-piercing shriek). Four pieces of bread, six trips outside to vomit more grease & bread, & one giant headache later, the Meat Man finally comes home from his fishing trip. And by this point, I'm like super-frazzled & ready to rip Kujo's the Little Tyrant's someone's vocal chords out. The vet tech finally calls me back to tell me to do what I already did. Hey, what's that pain in my lower abdomen? Oh great, I started my effing period, on top of everything else today. And I have no painkillers, except for some cold & cough, which makes me whacktastic. 

The Meat Man gives me a big, long hug & rubs my back & strokes my hair, while telling me it's going to be okay. He sits me down on the couch, gets me some cold medicine & some water, talks the Little Tyrant into helping him cook dinner, & makes me remember how awesome he really is. The end.

Today is Not An Awesome Day

Today is one of those days when the Little Tyrant wakes up in a foul mood & stays that way  AAALLLLLLL day. Not an awesome way to spend the day. He's been bossy, whiny, screechy, screamy, & downright just rude. 

We've been working on manners lately & apparently he has fallen under the impression that if he says "Please," he is entitled to whatever it is that he's begging for. So when I still tell him no, he cannot have a fifth peanut butter sandwich (after 2 bowls of oatmeal & some yogurt), he grabs me & tries to drag me over to the pantry, begging, "Come on, Mama, I get you buttah (peanut) buttah sandwich." I do not like being dragged around by a bossy 2-year-old & pulled my arm away & said firmly, "No. No more food until snack time. It is NOT snack time. Now get out of the pantry, please." (Our house shifted this summer & our pantry door hasn't shut ever since, which means he is constantly in there because his favorite thing in the whole world is food.)

At which point, my son turned into a fire-breathing little monster, somewhat akin to this:

I don't know how many other fellow LOTR geeks there are reading this, but seriously, I felt like itty-bitty-little Gandalf saying, "You shall not pass!" & then proceeding to get my eyebrows & eyelashes burned off by this hulking evil Balrog screaming in my face. The Little Tyrant's rage is awe-inspiring to behold in the sense that it never ceases to amaze me just how infuriated he will get over something so simple as the word, "No."

Yeah, it's totally not going to be an awesome, easy day with him. But that's okay. Because you know what? Breakfast & lunch are made, dishes are done, laundry is in progress, dinner is defrosting, I've got some music on to drown out the screeching, & the coffeemaker is even already fixed up for tomorrow morning. So I'm ahead of myself, chores-wise. And the Meat Man will be home soon from his fishing trip that I signed off on (even though I knew it'd mean a few more hours alone with this little demon child over here) & he is always happy & relaxed when he gets back from fishing, so I will feel totally unguilty passing off the little fireball to him.

Random "Late Night" Thoughts

I sit here naughtily smoking a cigarette in the house because it's so freezing-your-ass-off cold outside, the last one awake. The Little Tyrant has been asleep for a good hour now, passed smooth out on the living room floor & transported off to bed. The Meat Man is cuddled up on the couch, snoring, with 2 of our dogs. They, also, are snoring. Late night at my house is 9:00 p.m. Lord, we are such parents. In our defense, our day starts at 6:30 every morning. There's a good reason that we're so worn out at this time of the evening that we fall asleep on the couch. It's called a 2-year-old & 3 rowdy dogs. And today was actually a good day.

My last few mornings (with the exception of today) have started off with no coffee, which always makes for a bad day. Me without coffee is not a pretty sight, especially not in the morning. The first morning without my crack coffee, I realized while frowning at the pot for being empty, that it wasn't. After a few seconds of internal argument about how gross it would taste & realizing I didn't really care, I heated up the day-old coffee in the microwave & pretended it tasted good. At least it had some caffeine. And then I made the mistake of pouring the rest of it out & forgetting to run to the grocery store with the last of our change to buy more for the next day. The next morning, I glared at the coffee maker while I mentally kicked myself into next week.

It'd been a rather sleepless night, more so than usual even, because the Little Tyrant had slept most of the night in his room, but then woke the dogs up coming into our room. I just haven't been sleeping well for quite some time now; I blame it on many different things: hormones that got whacked when I was preggo (because I used to sleep like the dead), the Meat Man and/or the Little Tyrant's tornado-like sheet-twisting thrash-about sleeping tendencies with one miserable me sandwiched between them for the last year, my recently acquired Sonar Mommy Hearing (I can hear the slightest sound out of the ordinary while sleeping & am instantly wide-awake) which aggravates me to no end because as I said I have always been able to sleep through anything, the fact that until we gave up & put it on the floor a week ago my bed was a Pit of Death (the pit being a huge dip in the middle where I sleep, resulting in one or both of the boys rolling onto me 50,000 times a night, because gravity's just cool like that).

What I was really thinking

You'd think I'd be used to it already, but only with the crutch of a gigantic cup of joe to help me out. Of course, all 3 of the dogs & my son could definitely sense my weakness & proceeded to raise such a huge racket between the 4 of them that it made my head & ears ring to the point of closing my eyes & covering my ears while hollering at them to knock it off, PLEASE NOW, it's entirely too early for this sort of commotion & Mommy hasn't had any coffee yet. Closing my eyes was definitely not a good idea because the sleepy part of my brain kept trying to overrule the responsible mommy side that insists I stay awake while anyone else is awake because you just never can tell what kind of mischief these 5 are going to get into if I close my eyes for an instant.

My WTF happened to my house face

Many occasions that the Meat Man has kindly allowed me to sleep in while he gets up & takes care of things has brought me out of the bedroom with the decibel level, only to marvel at a huge mess & make some smartass comments about WTF his definition of taking care of things is b/c WTF HAPPENED?! This all happens when I open my mouth without the coffee filter on it & makes me seem terribly ungrateful, which really, I'm not. (No, really, honey...the first thing that should have come out of my mouth was "Thank you for letting me sleep in & cleaning the kitchen & starting the laundry & cooking breakfast while wrangling this mad house of animals." Really, I love you & you're the best.) I'm glad the Meat Man cleaned the kitchen, it's just...why is there such a mess in every other part of the house? Oh, right...because there were wild animals loose in the rest of the house while you were focused on cleaning. *sigh* Did it not occur to you, darling, that the puppy might have had to pee, just a few times (6 times, actually, according to the puddles) since you've been awake today? And you're telling me that you didn't see a single one of these puddles occur? And where exactly have you been? Just shut your mouth, T. Just shut your mouth & drink your effing coffee to give your brain a kickstart before you go take your foot out.

Anyway, back the coffee situation. My sweet husband had to work a few hours on what is normally his day off & got to drink coffee at work, but couldn't get away to bring me any. So you know what he did? He sent his boss over with a can for me. Isn't the the sweetest, most knight-in-shining-armor thing ever? I know, he's an effin rockstar. And I love him to pieces. Fortunately, this morning started with some coffee, hooray!

The last few days have been very trying with the Little Tyrant. Meltdown-a-licious, all around. Which is never fun for anyone. We had 2 really awful, frustrating days for everyone, followed by a great day today. But I spent most of today waiting for him to explode with the surreal feeling that at any moment, the sky was going to fall on me & I would regret my assessment of today being awesome. It wasn't though. It snowed a bit this morning, but was gone within 30 minutes. Wet snow & mostly just cold, miserable weather. I figured the Little Tyrant would pitch a huge fit about being confined indoors, but he handled it with grace today. And Toy Story 2 & 3 for the millionth time each, with running commentary. But hey, I'll take listening to Toy Story & my son's narration & never-ending fascination with these movies any day over his epic meltdown tantrums. Pixar & Disney, my ears & sanity thank you very much today. Thanks for making an inside day bearable for my little dude.

And thank you, to the Little Tyrant & whatever Powers-That-Be, for suddenly making him completely forsake his late afternoon napping habit (you know, the one in which he wakes up at 7:40 p.m. either awesomely or horribly & leaves the fate of our evenings resting on which mood he happens to choose upon waking) & deciding instead to fall asleep consistently around 6:00 to 7:30 every evening & sleep all through the night. That's pretty awesome. Even if it is only until 6:30 every morning. And even if it's not entirely in his own room. Beggars can't be choosers & I am so glad that the Grown-Ups now have some alone time for several hours every evening before the Sandman crawls out of the couch cushions & makes the Meat Man pass out while watching TV. Plus, what mom wouldn't be thankful for getting to shower alone every night this week? I know, I know. The excitement of my life is just unbearable, right? Hahaha.

In other random thoughts, Pandora Radio totally rocks my socks off tonight. I love how you always know just what to play for me to jam out to at any given moment, Pandora.

On that note, I have been yawning uncontrollably for the last 20 minutes & am now starting to wonder why I'm wasting precious sleeping time on this blog. Hopefully I will sleep better tonight with the comforter nailed over our northern-facing window that should keep the wicked northern wind from howling so viciously through the cracks in the window & keeping me awake with its frosty fingers. Good night!

The Madness of Holidays

Once again, another year has flown past us & here we are at the holiday season again. Didn't we just do this? I swear, it can't have been a year already. But alas, it has been. And so, the madness begins.

I have a love/hate relationship with the holiday season. I love certain things about them & hate other things.

Things I Love About The Holidays

• Halloween. I think this has always been my favorite holiday. What's not to love? Costumes, candy, scaring the crap out of little kids with our scary house, haunted houses, Fright Fest at Six Flags. Did I mention candy? Plus, this year was the first year the Little Tyrant picked out what he wanted to be (Batman) & went up to the door to knock by himself & say "trick or treat!" *sniff* My little guy is growing up so fast.
• Thanksgiving. Well, let me clarify. I love Thanksgiving food. There is nothing better than overeating lots & lots of delicious food. Especially when you get to share with your family. (As long as no one eats the last of something I wanted...then I might have to carve somebody open like a turkey, because I'm just evil like that. Especially over pecan pie.)
• Christmas. Mostly, I love decorating for Christmas. And baking all kinds of sweet goodies for me other people to eat. I love the look on my son's little face when he tears open the paper & sees his presents. I love egg nog & our family's tradition of opening gifts on Christmas Eve because my gramma is from Czechoslovakia & that's what her family has done for generations.
• Spending time with our big family. Fate made sure that I married into a family that I fit right into & I love hanging out with them. This year is the first year we've had a large combined family gathering with my in-laws & my parents & cousins. It was awesome. (Mostly because I didn't have to cook very much for our 30 person gathering because I took Pajamas & Coffee's advice on how to add some fun to a dysfunctional Thanksgiving & made everyone bring something. And used paper plates & plastic utensils, which meant NO DISHES!! MWAHAHAHA. WIN!)
• I love the fall colors. It is the beginning of December & there are still beautiful leaves on the trees to get into a car wreck watching gaze upon while safely on my porch. Autumn was lovely this year--very mild, windows-open-all-day kind of weather, which was a heavenly break from the 90 days of 110+ degree drought of this summer. Living in The Middle of F***ing No Where does have its benefits. Such as having to take long drives through the gorgeous wide-open countryside to get anywhere. I wish I was a painter because there are such beautiful scenes to be had around here & while I wish there was a way to capture them on camera, I decided that it probably isn't safe for me to do while driving.

Things I Hate About the Holidays

• Black Friday. I detest the idea of spending all night out shopping with a mad pack of hyenas shoppers, fighting over who gets the best deal or the last item on the shelf. I saw on the news that there were several incidences of pepper spraying & macing over such things. Not to mention the poor fellow who was shot in the head & died after some geniuses idiots decided that instead of waiting it out in the lines legally, why not just camp out in the parking lot to rob people of their purchases? Because Black Friday loot is totally worth the Murder 1 charge & the time you're going to spend in prison. The only way you'd ever catch me Black Friday shopping is from the comfort of my recliner, in my jammies, from my laptop, which is safely in my own house.
• Holiday Traffic. I hate traffic in general, but holiday traffic is the worst because it seems like every idiot on the planet is out operating a vehicle while swerving off the road because they've never heard of the hands-free setting on their cell phone. We made the hour & a half long drive down to Texas to go to my in-laws' Thanksgiving lunch & were almost killed not once, not twice, but THREE TIMES during said drive. Ridiculous. Makes me glad I have a Honda with such awesome safety features.
• Speaking of holiday travel, WTF is the deal with jacking up the gas prices? I cannot stand the gas prices anymore. It makes me feel old because I can remember when I was in high school, $10 would fill up my ginormous gas tank. Maybe it's because I'm cheap, but it makes me cringe with agony when I have to fork over almost $50 to fill up my tank now. However, again, thanks to my Honda for having such awesome gas mileage. I <3 you, car.
• I hate the complete spaz that my husband turns into when we're trying to make it somewhere on time during the holidays. I just assumed that everyone shared my belief that you're excused for being a few minutes late during the holidays (especially when you make as long a drive as we do) because what really matters is spending time with your family. But no, he turns into a trainwreck when we're 30 seconds late. And we bicker & b***h at each other the.whole.time. (In fact, by the time we finally get home around 2 am, I am always almost certain that if I had to spend one.more.second in the car with him, I would rip his voicebox out b/c I am SO tired of listening to him complain)
• I hate cramming our many, many family festivities into one (or 2, if we're lucky) days. It sucks. We live just far enough away that the drive is a huge pain in @$$ & like I mentioned before, my hubby gets spaztastic over being late. Which we always are, of course. We both tend to get cranky when we're away from our home for too long. And I dare you to try NOT to be cranky with the Little Tyrant in the backseat, repeating everything eleventy gajillion times (our names become one in the car: "MOMMYDADDY,LOOKLOOKLOOKLOOKLOOK!DIDYOUSEEDIDYOUSEEDIDYOUSEE?!"), randomly bursting your eardrums screeching, & then proceeding to have a meltdown about how he's stuck buckled in his seat. Oh yeah, and I forgot that our radio is also totally random in its choice of when to stop working & then when to start working again. So sometimes, this trip has no soundtrack either. Which is a big fat FAIL for me & the Meat Man...it's almost physically impossible to drive that far with a toddler with no music.

The madness of the holidays around our house is always compounded by the fact that, starting in September & finally tapering off in June, we have birthdays out the wazoo! I mark birthdays on our calendar in purple Sharpie & every month during this time, we have no less than 3 (sometimes as many as 8) birthdays in a given month. But being a part of such a huge, close-knit, loving, crazy family is amazing. And I really shouldn't complain. So I'll stop. Happy holidays & here's to hoping we all make it through this crazy time with our sanity intact.