Official

The papers came yesterday. I knew they were coming because I'd gotten a slapdash cellphone message from my lawyer, telling me it was over.

My lawyer - and it still feels funny to say those words, "My lawyer", so ridiculously grown-up sounding, so tragically responsible - is a kindly older gentleman, a friend of my parents. He doesn't practice divorce law but agreed to take my case because it was going to be a 'friendly, easy one'.

And it was.

The divorce, I mean. It was pretty much, on paper, very friendly. Very agreeable. No assets to speak of (duh), a handshake, a nod, a basic agreement on monthly child support, open visitation, custody. Straightforward. Easy. Simple.

Ha.

Divorce is never simple. Never easy.

When I opened the big white envelope and looked through the 'official' documents, I started to cry. I'm not even sure why. I've shed so many tears over the last year and a half over this crappy roadkill of a marriage, to continue crying over it seems redundant and childish and really, really fucking boring.

The wounds have long scabbed over and I've moved ahead with my life. I don't love this man anymore. We've been apart for so long that this, the divorce, was really just a technicality, insurance for me that our tangled, toxic history can finally be placed behind me, lock the door and throw away the key.

A wise man (my dad), told me, "There is no looking back now. You can only look ahead." And it's true. So true. Still, to see it there, on paper, 'Judgement Granted' as of December 12, 2008, it just made me feel so sad. There was a beginning date to this marriage, and now there was an end date.

I cried for my youth, for my brutal naivete and recklessness. For promises I never, ever should have made, wouldn't have made, had I not been 24 and idealistic and completely out of my mind.

I was having lunch with Kara today and we were talking about love and addiction, two themes with which we are both intimately acquainted.

As I sat across from her, talking, laughing, holding a hot cup of coffee between my palms, I felt like I stepped outside myself and was looking at a confident, calm, mature, accepting woman who was speaking with my voice.

Who the fuck was this woman? And how did she get here? How did she slip into this vinyl diner booth, where did she get the money to pay for her coffee?

And why is she wearing my jeans?

I said,
"Do you know what the best thing is about my life now? I'm not afraid of tragedy anymore. You know, I lived a somewhat sheltered life; nothing really bad ever happened to me. So when it did, it nearly destroyed me. I lived almost in fear of something tragic happening, because I knew that it was just, mathematically, only a matter of time. And now that it has, and because I lived through it and came out of it stronger, I know I could do it again. It won't kill me. Boy, is that liberating."

And that's the fucking truth.

So, yeah, I'm still not sure exactly why I was crying. Maybe it wasn't at all because, omg, I have no idea how I got to this place in my life.

Maybe, really, I was crying because on some level, all along, I always knew that I would.

Shaun Cassidy and me – The love story continues

Part II
Imaginary friends and paper towel tanktops
I continued to watch The Hardy Boys every week and despise that whore Nancy Drew.



And so my love for Shaun grew and grew, and, as is only natural, things progressed with us to the obvious next level:

The Hardy Boys had become my imaginary friends.

Here's how it worked. My friend Kelly, who lived down the block and had two older brothers who not only wouldn't play with her, but also tortured her, spent a lot of time at my house. We played pretend girl games like Gilligan's Island and Supermodel and she was, I think, the first person I ever kissed. We were five though, so calm down, you goddamned drooling sex perverts.

Anyway, Kelly always enthusiastically jumped right into the strange, illusory worlds I created. She was the perfect, willing beta to my alpha-girl commander of pretend play, always consenting to be Ken or Gilligan or even Jack in "Three's Company".

It was during these pretend games with Kelly that I first got the idea of playing Nancy Drew. This morphed into Nancy Drew and 'Friend' (She was, of course the 'friend'), then eventually it became Sexy Nancy Drew and 'Sexy Friend'.

Being sexy at five meant taking off our shirts and sneaking a paper towel roll up to my room, then ripping off lengths of Bounty and winding them around our middles, thereby creating our own home made tube tops. Crimes always got solved better when Sexy Nancy Drew and Sexy Friend wore disco clothes.

Now, in this game, we didn't actually solve any crimes, we just chased the Hardy Boys around my house. We would spend hours running up and down the stairs, clutching at our tube tops, popping in and out of bedrooms, on the hunt for those elusive Boys.
Once we found them, we would bring them back to my room (sometimes via lasso...I also loved Lynda Carter's 'Wonder Woman' at the time) and kiss them.

Chasing The Hardy Boys was hard, dirty work.
We would skid into the kitchen and demand my mother tell us their whereabouts. She'd look up, take a sip of coffee, then gesture wearily with her cigarette, "That way..." and go back to her book.

I played this game whenever Kelly came over, but also by myself. Sometimes I would skip the chasing part altogether and bring the Boys Hardy right into my room. Sometimes I let my little sister play too, but at three, Lisa did not yet understand the intricacies of seductively solving crime. Not to worry, though. That Christmas, Lisa and I would receive Shaun Cassidy dolls and things were about to completely change...



(to be continued...)

Shaun Cassidy and me

I would like to tell you guys a heartwarming holiday love story, delivered in several parts. Our tale begins in 1977 and comes full circle at its climactic end in the Christmas season of present day.


Part I

I was four years old in 1977. I first discovered Shaun Cassidy when my mother introduced me to "The Hardy Boys/Nancy Drew Mysteries" television show. I'd had a collection of old Nancy Drew books in my room that, since I couldn't read yet, I used for playing library, pretend-stamping the inside of each worn hardcover and marveling over the 1950's black-and-white drawings of Nancy in various states of peril.

I didn't know then that I would later grow to hate that bitch of a girl sleuth and burn at her with misunderstood carnal envy. See, not only was Nancy Drew a cool teenager, with developed breasts and long feathered hair and eyeliner, but she also got to solve dangerous crimes every week with Joe Hardy (played, of course, by Shaun Cassidy), who was a rock-star/boy detective with chest hair, and on whom I had developed a hardcore fixation.

I watched the show every week with religious fervor. I pulled the groovy gold pillows off our couch and arranged them the floor where I lay with my black lab, pretending to brush her with an ashtray while I somehow tried to make the precious hour of mystery and romance go sloooower.

My mother, with an instinct to feed her little child's interests/obsessions (a drive I fully understand now because of "High School Musical"), bought me Shaun Cassidy's rock record, which became my favorite thing ever.



I didn't realize until years later that "Da Do Run Run" and "Be My Baby" were not songs stolen from Shaun, original writer and performer. In my eyes he was a rock god. But the best part of the album was the centerfold inside the record sleeve. This was a full-frontal photo of Shaun lounging against a rock or a tree, wearing tight jeans that emphasized the wonderful bulge of his crotch.

I will confess that, after being tucked into my white canopy bed at night, I pulled that centerfold out from under my pillow and licked that bulge so many times that it began to look worped and worn. I simply couldn't help myself.



I got my hands on one of my older cousin's "Tiger Beat" magazines and convinced her to give me a glossy pull-out photo of Shaun, which I then taped to a pillow and stashed in my closet to also took out at night, in order to practice my kissing. (Again, this was really only licking the picture until there was a hole in Shaun's mouth, because I had no idea how to kiss yet.)

But I needed to be ready for when I actually met him.



I was utterly, utterly convinced that when I got old enough, I would go to Hollywood and sit in the front row of his concert and he'd drop his microphone, shocked at the sight of me, and pull me up onstage to sing "Be My Baby" to me.

Yes, Shaun. Yes, of course I will. Duh.

To be continued...

Because I love you.

And I want you to have a good weekend.

Tee hee.

Oh, and I hope you all have lots and lots of sexual intercourse this holiday.

Mwah!

Apparently I have bad gaydar.

When I'm bored at work I like to play this game in my head called 'gay or not gay?'

I listen to the conversations of my co-workers and watch their moves and try and figure it out.

Apparently my gaydar sucks, though, because there's one guy I work with who I have known for a while; he is short and smells really good and always comes over to my desk to say hi and shoot the shit about graphic design and I kind of always thought he was flirting with me. I just found out, however, that he has had a serious boyfriend for like, years. Huh.

Also, there's one guy who absolutely stumps me. Here are some thing's I've observed about him, and maybe you guys can help me figure out whether he's dick or vagina:

1. Likes to greet people with "Ciao!"

2. Apologized yesterday to a co-worker for being 'so bitchy before'

3. Whistles and sings to himself at his desk, a mixed variety of top-40 songs, especially Pink and Celine Dion, and this morning he was singing "We are all in this together" from High School Musical

4. Has professionally frosted hair

5. Talks to grandmother daily on phone

6. Has 2008 calendar on desk of Rockefeller Center

7. Has paperclips on desk arranged in separate containers, organized by size

8. Gets pissed when co-workers borrow his febreeze without asking

I need some help here, bloggers. I am stumped, stumped, stumped.

Kisses.

Santa is made-up, sweetie. Just like god.

I sort of tread lightly around the idea of Santa Claus.

Don't get me wrong. I'm no scrooge, but I simply don't like to encourage the belief that, instead of me getting Lily gifts, there is a fat jolly old bitch who sneaks in the window (we live in an apartment, so we've had to revise the story somewhat...no chimney. So Santa is a sort of creepy cat burglar), and brings her presents that he made in his 'toyshop' (China).

While I certainly don't want to have that kid who marches into kindergarten and ruins Christmas for all her pals by announcing that Santa is bullshit, I'm not a big fan of lying to my daughter, either. Especially when I'm a hardworking single mama who isn't that keen on letting some made up guy take credit for bringing my kid shit that my hard-earned dollars bought, that my tired ass waited in line at Kay Bee's going out of business sale to purchase, that I spent precious work hours online at Amazon to order.

Still, there is merit to the magic of Santa. I have learned much since last Christmas.

But. Unless Lily comes out and asks me if Santa is real, which she hasn't, I sort of just don't mention him. He's there in the backdrop, a nice idea, part of a Christmas parable that makes the holiday more magical and sweet. But I think the holiday is about so much more than presents and Santa Claus. I don't really talk about him that much, and I certainly don't weild him as a weapon to keep Lily's behavior in line, as so many American parents seem to do. There's this secretary at work, who I hear daily screaming on the phone at her four year old, "Stop hitting Grandpa, or Santa won't bring you any toys!!!"

That shit is fucked up.

It's a Christmas miracle!

Wheeeee!

It's a new week, and I still have a job. It's 65 degrees outside (WHAT?!), yes, it fucking is, and I'm determined to let the sunshine in. I'm about to take a lunch break and go enjoy the Christmas finery glittering along 5th avenue, while licking an ice cream cone in short shorts and flip flops.

These are strange times, indeed.

This weekend Lily and I found the only theater in New York City that was still showing "High School Musical 3" and I stuffed my purse with juice boxes, pirates booty and smoked almonds (my lame version of movie junk food). Dude, that movie was so freaking good. It just made me totally giddy. And I deserves some fucking giddy. Lil and I were dancing in our seats and clapping like maniacs. I swear to god I was a gay man in a past life.

I feel like I wouldn't like me if I met me

This week has sucked a bunch of hemorrhoid-riddled anus.

First, I seem to have an ever-diminishing supply of pants that I can still button, and even fewer without visible coffee stains. Reaching into my closet to pull out one of these winners first thing in the morning really sets a shitty tone for the whole day, ya know?

Plus, my workweek has felt like one continuous episode of "American Idol"; I've been watching, with diarrheah-inducing nervousness, as a parade of my co-workers gets called into my supervisors office to find out if they are "safe" or "in the bottom three" or simply getting booted off the show (with a generous severance package!).

Also, it has rained for the last three consecutive days and you know what havoc that wreaks on my hair.

And, um, I gave blood yesterday and have decided I'd like it back. I can't afford to give away any more parts of myself, as it turns out. I feel like I've lost some of my powers.

All this bullshit is making me feel unsettled and kind of frightened, frankly.

A normal girl might just let go a little and allow the people around her to pick up the slack for once. But not me.

No, sir. I put on my bitch face and curl up in a ball on my couch and seethe and throw things at people.

Now, Git

Hey! I'm blogging over here today.

Because on that blog, I can say even more retarded things.

Come visit! Bring friends!

Signs, signs, everywhere signs

With the close of another year, I find myself reflective.

Sigh.

As Lily gets another year older, I think back on all the things I didn't know about when she was a baby. Goddamn, I was an ignoramus. I realize that if I ever had another child, I'd be certain to pay closer attention to certain signs.

God, I wish I'd known about the signs when Lily was a baby. Things would have been SO much easier.

Alas. In spite of my own bumbling ineptitude, I have managed to keep my daughter alive for the last 5 or so years. And because I am a caring nurterer, I want to pass on some of the things I've learned. You know, in the interest of helping you all out with your own families.

For instance:


It's really important, when taking your baby out to see the friendly neighborhood garbage truck pick up its daily load in the morning, to remember not to stand directly under the dumpster. That shit is way heavy. You never know, you know?


Don't run over your baby with a tractor.


Plastic bags, though really sweet-looking adornments, do not really make good hats.


Oversized buckets filled with unidentifiable substances (such as, say, pickle brine, cleaning solution, vodka, lye) should be kept on high shelves so that baby cannot fall into them (and you KNOW those babies are curious!)


And finally, I think just as a general rule, keep this one in mind:



Watch out for those goddamned little buggers, man. They will fuck your shit up. They will take away your ability to ever have a good nights sleep for the rest of your life, because in the beginning, they want to freaking breastfeed all the time. Then, they keep you awake at night because all you do is worry about them. These are the things nobody tells you. Watch out. Also, they will rob you blind. Keep your wits about you. Just a friendly warning.

Here's to a FINE '09!!!

Freedom's just another word for nothin' left to lose

OMG, I just came into work this morning and was greeted by the coolest thing: an email from the CEO of my company!!!

I know, ME! Getting an e-mail from the CEO!!! So cool!!!

The message outlines the "Accelerated implementation of our strategic plan" for 2009.
Neat!!!

First, it's super cool that the CEO would think to include me on the distribution list of this very important email...moi, a lowly contractor, a spec, really, swimming under the radar in the tiny creative department of my buttoned-down corporation. I am so psyched to be receiving this 'top secret inside information' about the company's 'strategic plan'. I mean, you know you've really arrived when you start receiving The Corporate Spam.

And, well, since I have a teeny girl brain and I don't speak CEO, I had to have a co-worker come over to my cubicle and translate the exciting news about 2009 for me.

Okay, lessee....Lemme break it down for you:

1. Strategic Plan = Laying off 5300 employees! Wow! That is some real creative thinking. Lighten the load, make the company stronger!!! I feel ya!

2. Accelerated = We were gonna wait til some time next year to do this, but, aw fuck, let's just do it now. This way you can get some 'extra holiday bonding time' with your families, and run back to the mall to return all those Christmas gifts you bought that you won't be able to pay off when the Visa bill comes next month. Your kids don't NEED all that crap, anyway. Also, you'll probably need the extra time to put your house on the market and call your parents to see if you can move back in with them for a while. Cool? Cool. You know, it's all about people in this business.

Looks like perhaps I picked a good time to be a freelancer. Unnattached, flowing in the wind...and available to help my friends pack up their personal belongings in boxes and cart them out to their cars.

Gulp.

Quite the conundrum

Well, I just went to the ladies room at work.

And there, in the stall I generally frequent (third one in...never, EVER use the first one; it is, statistically speaking, the one used most often and, in my opinion, the one most likely to give you crabs), I saw the strangest thing.

Behind the toilet was a big piece of lettuce.

Now. How the heck'd that get there????

Inquiring minds want to know.

Thoughts?

Happy Anniversary to Me

Exactly one year ago I started this blog.

It's been quite a year, my friends. Quite a year.

I've met a lot of wonderful people through this blog, and I love reading your posts and look forward to all your comments.

For those of you who have been entertained by my ramblings, I thank you for visiting and continuing to come back. For those of you who come here hoping to see naked pictures of me, I will continue to taunt you with the possibility of that in the future.

Thanks, y'all!!!

MWAH!!!!

Colon Blow

I was reminded of this video by Catscratch Diva's comment. Thanks, Cat!

This could be me this weekend (fingers crossed!)

It's not unusual to be loved by anyone

Happy Thanksgiving, lovers!

How was your holiday? Happy? Plentiful? Mine certainly was.

My family and I ate like starved dogs yesterday afternoon (Thanks mom!), and then I kicked off my shoes and retired to the couch to pass out. I was later pulled from the sticky web of my food coma when my dad produced a VHS tape of all the home movies my grandfather had taken of us when we were little. My parents had had them transferred to video and we all decided to watch. So I grabbed some cold stuffing and Lily and I snuggled together on the couch.

Holy Christ. My grandfather was a man of few words, but he was a quiet artist of sorts, and managed to capture moments on his old fashioned silent video camera that I'd forgotten even happened. His movies of our family were intermixed with trips he and my grandmother took all over the country (My mom and I both shrieked with delight when, in a shot of 1960s Vegas we saw a sign outside the Flamingo Club for TOM JONES: ONE NIGHT ONLY), and he managed to get some really beautiful shots that conjured up memories I hadn't expected.

Being the body-obsessed freak that I am, I was of course transfixed on the evolution of my chubby little girlbody throughout the many stages of my childhood captured on betamax.

I'm glad that Lily's lithe little string bean frame seems to take more after her father's Irish potato famine side of the family rather than my homemade manicotti-loving, wine glugging, Italian side. It will hopefully save her some middle-school heartache and money on therapy later in life.

Anyway, I never weigh myself. I do not keep a scale in my home, and I never step on one, unless forced to at my yearly checkup, and even then it makes my palms sweaty and my heart pound. Is there a story behind this? Yes, of course. Am I going to tell you? Not today, no.

In any event, my parents own a scale. And, since I've noticed that the majority of my pants have been getting increasingly difficult to button over the last 6 months(due to, I am imagining, a heavy dose of romance, thai takeout and a bit more red wine than necessary), I wanted to see for myself exactly how much weight I'd gained since last stepping on a scale.

Well, holy fuck.

Um, more than I'd expected.

So, in anticipation of a long holiday season filled with debauchery and home made baked goods, I thought I'd take some preventative steps and do a little detoxing beforehand.

I did the Master Cleanse once before, and it was not fucking fun. In fact, I wanted to kill myself.

BUT I didn't drink caffeine during it, and this time I plan to dose myself with green tea in addition to spicy lemonade.

Also, I only lasted three days last time, but I did feel pretty damn good afterwards. Anyway, I think this is probably a good way to kick over a new leaf and get back to healthy, glowy me. We'll see.

Train to Crazytown

I was pleasantly surprised this morning to get on the W train and flop my hiney into one of many available seats. I cracked open the Metro and basked in the soft, noisless calm of a morning commute during a holiday week. Aaaaah.

Then the train rolled up on the Lexington Avenue stop. As we slowly approached the crowded platform, I heard an eerie sound that I couldn't quite place. Could one thousand bunnies be getting mutilated with ice picks on the subway platform? No, no, no...that can't be it. Maybe it was a child screaming, I thought.

Awsome. There's must be an angry toddler, strapped in a stroller against his will, freaking the fuck out and about to be wheeled right into my car, signaling the end of my peaceful ride to work. Great. Thanks, god. Fucker.

I looked through the windows and was unable to see the shrieking little fucker in the crowd. Man, he was mad, huh? And as the doors opened the raspy, phelgm-choked warbles got louder, and then I saw the source of the noise.

It wasn't a child at all. It was a middle-aged woman.

She was clad in a heavy red parka and had short hair and horn-rimmed glasses. Strapped to her back was a brand-new backpack with a NY Jets emblem on it (and they won this week, so I know that wasn't making her upset).

Wait, what? This woman looked like a librarian or a first grade teacher, not some lunatic shrieker.

And yet. As the doors closed, encasing this horrified, psychotic littler person in the car with us, she continued to pour forth a bone-chilling shriek, kicking occasionally at the heavy metal subway doors with her sneakered feet. From time to time I could make out some form of a sentence in her shrieking: "NONONOIDON'TWANNA", or something to that effect.

It was creepy and sad, but New Yorkers have a way of deciphering right away when a crazy person is dangerous, or just a run-of-the-mill spectacle we simply shouldn't make eye contact with. This lady was clearly the latter, as was evident in the way the commuters (myself included) eyed her with mild curiosity, then calmly inserted our ear buds and cranked up our ipods.

Now, I couldn't help feeling a little badly about this (I'm Italian, and also was rasied Catholic, so guilt is sort of my stock emotion most of the time, but still); I felt bad that our first instinct is to ignore someone right in front of us with an obvious mental illness. The mommy in me wanted to walk up to the woman and wrap my arms around her until her screaming ceased. I wanted to just hug the shit out of whatever inner child was reliving a terrible trauma continuously on the MTA for all of early morning NYC to see.

I'm not gonna stand on some soap box and expound on the ills of a society that treats the crazies of the world with antipathy and disdain. The whole thing just struck me as sad, is all. I'll leave it at that.

Poetry

My friend Mary Catherine just posted a bunch of new poetry on her facebook page. And this inspired me to write some poems, too. See, I've had a rather annoying weekend. Nothing terrible happened, just a series of irritating events that sorta scraped me raw, made me tired and irritable...kind of like if my sanity was slowly and repeatedly rubbed with a cheese grater over the course of 36 hours.

So, by Sunday night, I had to decide whether to laugh or cry at the state of things.

So, I decided that I would write some poems, because when the going gets tough, the tough get poetic. I don't know if you guys knew that I wrote poetry.

Well, I do. And it's pretty goddamned awesome. And I've decided to post a few for you, because good art should be shared.

HA-HA
Roses are red
Violets are blue
Remember on Saturday night, how you accidentally called me from the strip club you were at or wherever at 1:30 in the morning because your cell phone was in your pocket or something and you woke both me and Lily up?
That was really funny.



CONTEMPLATING
I was just laying in the tub
staring down at my naked form
and realized how awesome it is
that I never have to have sex with you again.



TRUST
It would be nice
If sometimes I could give you my ATM card
And send you to the cash machine down the street
So you could take out some money to pay the Chinese food delivery guy
And I could stay home and play with Lily and relax and not worry about you stealing money from my bank account.

Domo Arigato, Mrs. Roboto

You're not supposed to come out of a parent-teacher conference sweating and fighting the desire to go home and self-flagellate.

But twenty minutes with the droid who calls herself my kid's kindergarten teacher made me want to scratch at myself till I bled. I, along with some other parents, have noticed that this chick doesn't exactly give off the warm-and-fuzzies usually associated with a kindergarten teacher, but last night I began to really think she was in the wrong field. Maybe she'd make a good banker. Or a vice cop.

Shawn and I sat on tiny chairs with halved tennis balls stuck on the bottoms of the legs ("Cute touch," I said. "Yes, it reduces the noise," Robotface responded),
and listened to this 24-year-old, childless virtuoso of child development explain, with no lack of judginess, how she is 'concerned' about Lily's 'kissing the boys'.

Interesting.

"Really?" I asked, "Kissing boys? More than one boy?"

No, said Bionica. Just one boy.

Ah.

"Which boy?" asked her father.

"Oh," she quipped. "Well, she's kissed Lucas a few times."

Aha. Lucas. Right.

Lucas, who has been her best friend since she was 6 months old. Lucas, who is the only boy from our neighborhood to be accepted with Lily to their K-12 charter school. Lucas, who, during a playdate about two years ago, got into Lily's toddler bed with her and pretended to be the "Daddy" (which entailed rolling over and looking annoyed as Lily sat up and "nursed" her baby doll).

Lucas, whose mother is my one of my best friends.

Yeah, I'm worried about Lily kissing Lucas.

I think, if I were this teacher, I'd be more worried about finding a new job when I get her ass fired.



Have a wonderful weekend, M'Lovies!!!

Enjoy the silence?

It's weird. I'll have a week when I'm all but bubbling over with inane observations on politics, parenting and Lindsay Lohan, and then I'll just get stopped up and have nothing to say to you guys. Like there's a big, fat tampon stuck up my brain or something.

But fear not, faithful readers. I'm back. And I've much to say.

Not really. But there is big news... Babydaddy got his own place.
After gypsying around NYC for the last 18 months, patrolling various friends' couches and grabbing quick bits of nutritive sustenance at the home of yours truly, Shawn's moved into his own apartment. Praise all that is holy and the blessed virgin!

He has his own room in a large apartment that is close to Lily's school and is inhabited by quiet, dumpling-frying Chinese men.

Last night Lily had her first sleepover at Daddy's. I was excited for them to have some bonding time with each other and for me to have some bonding time with a bottle of merlot. But instead of reveling in the peace of a night to myself, it, I found myself suffocated by the quiet. I got naked and shuffled through the rooms of my apartment in my slippers, talking to the cat about how it was flurrying outside and did he want to watch "The Office" with me? I got three DVDs from Netflix!
But he just looked at me with lazy disinterest and rolled over for his belly to be scratched.

This morning was even weirder. How strange to take a shower by myself without a little person shrieking from the living room,
'MAMA, ARE THESE ON THE RIGHT FEET?!????!!!!!'

How interesting to watch the news without the warble of my 5-year-old lobbying for "Dragon Tails"; how foreign to wrap only myself in outerwear, to make sure only one person peed before venturing out into the bone-cold morning air.
I walked right to the subway without making the long detour to the bus stop, without Lily skipping next to me, chattering away in a faux-fur coat and licking the peanut-butter coating off her granola bar.

All in all, it was kind of a letdown. It really sort of sucked.

I miss her.

In other news, I have a cold sore. It's gross. And it hurts, especially since last night I accidentally bit it in my sleep. I've never had the mouth herpes before, and can't shake the vicious irony that I made it through all of my whoring college years without contracting an STD and suddenly at 35 I loook like I've been sucking dick in an alley. I've been dabbing at it with tea tree oil, because I'm all natural and shit. But damn, how long does it take for these things to go away?

Happy Wednesday!!!

Whoopsie

I love when celebrities say really dumb shit.
Poor Lindsay Lohan. It's not like she needs any help looking like an ignoramus.

I had to watch it a few times to figure out what she muttered under her breath, but I'm pretty sure it was an unpleasant descriptive word for African Americans that hasn't been politically correct to use since blacks and whites had to use separate water fountains.




So, thoughts?

Did she say "colored" president?
Did she say "Good" president?

Yeah, um, Lindz, the trailer park called. It needs it's trash back.

NaBloPoMo, No problemo

Except, no.

I considered doing this for exactly three seconds, thinking, Hey! Here's the perfect creative exercise to force to write every day! Except that

a. Thinking about doing that makes my neck break out in itchy blotches as I revisit college expository writing classes, taught by el beatnik jerkoff in a black turtleneck. This jackass liked to show up at the bar on Thursday nights, buy us shots, and then conveniently 'forget' how he'd propositioned me by Friday morning.
Plus, being forced to 'freewrite' in this manner tends to conjur up nothing but traumatic memories and I have a therapist for that, so thanks anyway, hoss.

b. I could torture you guys with a daily spew about some funny shit Lily did, or how annoyed I get with my ex husband on a daily basis, simply so that I can say I wrote something on this blog every day for a month, but I like you guys too much to do that to you. Well, some of you. A couple, maybe.

So I'll just take a moment to tell you all that I am in a disgustingly good mood today. I started taking B vitamins, and I'll tell you, my serotonin levels are through the roof.

Also, Starbucks has put the holiday cups into rotation, so IT'S ON.
There's something about those crimson hotcups with the scattered snowflakes that just makes me feel happy. My $5 latte tastes better in that cup. I see people wrapped in their wooly coats on the chilly streets of Manhattan and just sort of give them a nod and raise my cup a little bit at them, like, yeah, man. I get you. Totally. Sympatico. We are one.



Things are looking up.

Life is short

This was my first thought when I woke up this morning with a 5 year old's leg slung over my shoulder and a fat, purring cat sprawled across my back.

I woke from a dream where Lily and I were friends with Billy Joel and were invited to his house for a playdate with his children. Yeah, I know he only has one grown daughter. I'm from Long Island. Pipe down.

So, we were given very strange and secret mapquest directions and drove to his house on a four-wheeler because we had to take all these dusty back roads. Then we got to his mansion and Christie Brinkley was living there, in her own section of the house. And I was like, awww, it's so cool that they are keeping it friendly for the kids.

Hmmmm. Wonder what's been going through my brain lately?

So, we had birthday party number 3 yesterday, and all I can say is thank the holy ghost all that crap is over. Lily managed to keep her Princess Leia buns on all day though, and dang, she looked cute.

I'm going to try and practice meditative breathing this week. Life is short. Why be a hater?

Leia.


Help me, Baby Wan Kenobi. You're my only hope. Omglol

Bye, Bye, Fuckface

Helloooooo, Democracy!!!!

TAG.

Yay!!! I've been given the smackdown! From Kirsten, my new favorite psychomommy. How could you now love a woman whose blog is called "Momjeans", for christ sakes?

It's simple. Just write six random facts about yourself. Then tag six friends.

Wheeee!

1. I used to want to be a news anchor and a professional author and Debbie Gibson.

2. My parents have been married for 38 years. My sister and I are both divorced.

3. I met my boyfriend on blogger.

4. I love slippers. I have about 5 pair of them. I need to change into them as soon as I get home from work. If I'm not wearing them around the house, I feel awfully naked.

5. In 1996 I drove cross-country by myself and my car overheated in the Mojave Desert. It was 100 degrees, and I had no cell phone, no credit cards, and about $100 in cash. Maybe I had a phone card. What an asshole.

6. When Lily was born she was really sick, and I slept with a lucky stone that a crazy hippie lady gave me on my wedding day. I rubbed it all night long every night with my thumb and she got better. Somehow a part of me still thinks the rock had something to do with this. I still have the rock on my book shelf.

OK fuckers, here's to you:

Do this, Jack, because you say I never tag you. You know I love you though, so here.

XL, I want to hear from you.

Jeremy, because you're you.

Hey Kim! Tag!!!

Hi, Ron...you've got work to do...

Kara, because you haven't blogged in weeks. Come back to me.

Halloween candy + ice cream cake + free-flowing merlot = I can't button my pants.

WTF??? I am wearing a pair of pants at work today that were so big on me a year ago I needed a belt with them. A BELT, MOTHERFUCKERS!!!

Now, I sit indian-style at my desk and feel my tummy bulge over the rim of these bad boys that I could barely fucking snap this morning. A tummy, I should mention, that is slowly creeping its way into part of my back. What do you even call that, a back-belly? That shit ain't right.

My friend Kelly came over for Lily's birthday on Saturday and we were comparing our ruined stomachs, hiking up our shirts and grabbing fists full of gut bulge, trying to gross each other out. Only, she has a rock-hard yogabody that she'll bounce back to in a few months, since she had her second baby a mere six months ago. Me, I had one child five years ago. So what, I ask you, is my excuse?

When my marriage came crashing down around me a year and a half ago, I went on an involuntary hunger strike and got all hot and gaunt-looking, so much so that it led my friend Kara to say, "Hey, dispair suits you!" And I actually thought that was such a great compliment, I used it as my Myspace quote. Hey, old habits die hard.

But what's this, god? You've got to be all 'fair and shit'? Now that I'm feeling all happy again, I have to get fat? This hardly seems fair. At least let me button my goddamned pants.

On that note, here are photos of Lily in her pumpkin costume. And yes, she did refuse to wear it trick-or-treating. Instead she donned her crappy piece of shit Cinderella dress and some fairy wings and decided to be a flying princess. She didn't trick-or-treat anyway, she ended up getting upset in the stairwell of Heather's building, and watching tv with her friend Lucas's grandma in their apartment instead. This was very upsetting for me when I went clawing through her candy stash that evening, only to find some skittles (blegh) and a few measly peanut butter cups. Ah, well. I still can't button my pants though, so fuck everyone.

Why don't ghosts have kids? Because they have Halloweenies. OMGLOLLOLLOLROFLMFAO!!!!!!!!

Hello my ghouls and gremlins,

HAPPY HALLOWEEN!!!!!!

My, my, my, I am an ambitious little blogger, aren't I? Well, I've just so much to say, lately. There's no stopping me. So don't even try. Really. I'm warning you.

I love this time of year. I would say that from about Oct. 1 - Jan. 1 I am generally in a very happy, festive mood (unless you do something to piss me off).

Halloween kicks off a season of crispy weather, hot decorations, and a lightheartedness in New Yorkers that can only be experienced this time of year.

Tomorrow I will officially be the proud mama of a freshly minted five year old. And then I'll start shopping for a Tofurkey. And then we'll start putting candy canes on everything. Wheeee!!!

So, we got up this morning and Lily actually consented to wear her pumpkin costume to school. Shawn took her to school on the subway, giant orange pillow-thingy (handmade by gramma) in hand, while Lil worked the pole and chattered about how much fun she was about to have. Babydaddy brought the camera so he could snap pics at school before she decides it's fucking horribly uncomfortable to wear a giant orange pumpkin costume all day, so I'll have pictures to post soon. I just know that for the parade and trick or treating tonight, she's gonna demand I let her wear her cheap ass made-in-Korea Cinderella dress instead. But, I'm enjoying it while it lasts.

Tomorrow we celebrate her birthday. This morning I started reminiscing (a tradition my mother had with me, and one I warned Lil will last her entire life)...
"Five years ago right now, I started having contractions!"
"Five years ago right now I was jumping up and down on the bed, trying to get my water to break!"
"Five years ago right now I was in so much body-rocking pain that I projectile vomited and farted at the same time!!!"

She's tolerating my sentimentality for now. What can I say, it's my thing. It's what I do.

On a weird note, I got a call from my mother today and she told me how my father was summoned to my nephew's kindergarten yesterday morning, because he had somehow wedged the little flat handle of his jacket's zipper between his two front teeth. Dad got there and the poor little guy was totally panicked, his jacket up over his mouth, unable to get the zipper out himself. Dad saved the day, as usual, and all was well.

And life goes on.

Have a great day, ghoulies!!! I can't wait to hear all your debaucherous, horrifying Halloween tales. Stay safe, and look out for razor blades in the apples.

MWAH!!!


Lil got Sea Monkeys for her birthday!!!

I know my Mommy loves me

Because she made me this video.



OBAMA 4 CHANGE!!! KICK ASS NOVEMBER 4!!!!

And it's got Bea Arthur in it.

Last night Lily and I were on the Youtube, because she is having a Pirate/Princess themed birthday party next weekend, and I convinced her it would be really cool if she dressed up like Princess Leia.

Now, getting Lily to do this was quite a feat, since my child is kinda rather obsessed with the fake plasticky princesses of the Disney variety. Wee one is hard-pressed to accept that other princesses could actually exist without candy-colored dresses and heavy merchandising. If you can't buy vitamins shaped like her, maybe she's not a real princess, is her thought. So she eyed me with suspicion when I initially made the recommendation.

This was understandable, since up until yesterday Lily's only familiarity with Princess Leia was that her head was on a Pez dispenser in my collection, and that she was in a movie with the green guy with the pointy ears who is also on a Pez dispenser. But I was able to locate some great images to show her, and once she saw the buns, she was totally into it. The buns always sell themselves, really.

This killed me though. Absolutely killed me. Apparently, there was a Star Wars Christmas Special, which aired in December of 1978, one time only, and was never seen again. If you watch this clip, you can probably figure out why.

I think we should start a letter-writing campaign though to George Lucas and rain down on the Skywalker Ranch with requests to get this puppy on DVD. It's freaking priceless, I'm telling you.

Knock yourselves out.
Mwah.

Seriously, now.

I think, perhaps, that I am offended.

This weekend I went to my mailbox to see if Netflix had delivered my copy of "The Business of Being Born" (I've got babies on the brain for some reason...last night I dreamed that I watched a woman shoot a baby out while holding this yoga position:

and the baby came out smiling and stood right up and waved at the crowd of onlookers)


I only check my mail every few days, mostly because what I receive is bullshit. Lots of credit card offers (now that I'm single and ready to mingle, companies think I have money. Which is funny), ads for local politicians, bills, "Vegetarian Times". If I miss the mail for a few days I'm not exactly upset.

But this time I pulled out an oversized envelope which was stamped with a nebulous (and large) message reading, "Let's Face It Now".

It? Well, what are we facing? And why now? I've got so much shit to do.

I opened the sketchified mystery package and inside was this.



An elaborate brochure advertising a mausoleum.

For as low as $40 a month, I can start paying off my final resting place.

That is the most depressing thing I have ever heard.

Also, it doesn't help the cause that the brochure probably hasn't been updated since 1975. I mean, look at the yellowed photos...I bet if you pulled back you'd see a baby blue Edsel parked by a gravesite.



So tell me, guys...what does it mean when you start receiving direct mail from cemeteries?

Looks like I picked the wrong week to stop sniffing glue

...And the wrong year to be a contracted graphic designer at an investment bank, D'oh!

Oh, it's just so typical. I finally pop a tentative pinky toe back into the vast sea of the American workforce (after a 3.5 year hiatus to be home with Lily), and the economy dumps itself so far down the crapper it may take years for it to come back.
Great, that's just great. Thanks, god. Kick ass.

I can't shake the same sinking feeling I had when, a year after moving to NYC, 9/11 happened. I am starting to see a trend here, folks. I know it's egocentric, but you can't deny the 'coincidences'.

I obviously make things happen. Bad things. Maybe I'm tainted. Or radioactive. Or just a plain old bad luck charm, like The Hope Diamond. Those of you in Los Angeles (and you know who you are) better thank your lucky stars I haven't moved into your neighborhood, because you just know the Big One is waiting for me to hit town before it rocks the state of California into the ocean, Thank You and Good Night.

But I digress.

I can't spend hours obsessing over the (very real) possiblitiy of losing my job. I'm trying, instead, to get proactive. Focus my energies on my god-given talents and brainstorm about what I can do to ensure that Lily and I don't end up on the street, or worse, back on Long Island. (Just kidding mom! Hee hee! Still got that spare bedroom, right?)

So on my way to the train this morning I saw my scantily-clad neighbor who I am pretty sure is what you disgusting people call a Lady of the Evening.
The difference is, though, that she treks up and down the streets at all hours of the day and night in her Spandex microminis and rubber boots. She gets into black Lincoln Town Cars with tinted windows and speeds off to unknown neighborhood destinations, to engage in activities I can only imagine in my (very vivid, somewhat horny) imagination.

I don't know. I could be totally off the mark here. Maybe she is just a Starbucks barista who likes to dress slutty and splurge on car services to work. But really, I don't think so.

So, here's what I'm thinking. It's good to have a backup career, right? And you should pick something you're good at, otherwise, what's the point? And in this economy, I think a cash business is really the best way to go.

So, I figure I'll catch her on her way to 'work' on one of these breezy mornings/afternoons/evenings, and sort of chat her up about how one might go about breaking into her 'profession'.


Like I said, proactive, folks. Get your ducks lined up in a row and have a backup plan. Watch and learn from me, darlings.

Watch and learn.

Can you see with those on? Yeah, but it's really dark.

This was the exchange I had with Lily this morning after, upon walking out into the semi-darkness of our predawn trudge to the bus stop, she insisted on wearing her sunglasses. She was also wearing her faux fur coat, which is badly in need of a toss in the gentle cycle, a pink floppy hat, and a string of hot pink beads that somehow got twisted around her neck about a block from the house and she started grabbing at it, "Mama! I'm stuck!"

Quick-thinking wondermother plucked the necklace from her tender throat and and placed it in my pocket for safekeeping (ie to be tossed in the garbage as soon as I saw her off to school). She also decided to hand me the glasses before the end of our walk, and those got slipped into my pocket without a thought as well. She said, "Mama, don't forget to give those back to me! I want to wear them to school!"

We met up with my friend Julie and her daughter Ella, and listened to their little girl conversation as we hurried to meet the school bus. (Ella: "who invented food?"
Lily: "My mom doesn't like to eat pigs or cows")

It wasn't until I got off the train in the city and started walking to work that I put my hand in my pocket and felt the little sunglasses.

Sometimes being a working mother is kind of hard.

It was never easy for me. I was born a poor black child. I remember the days, sittin' on the porch with my family...

Actually, that's a big, fat lie. I was born a cute white girl in upper middle-class suburbia whose only inherent detriment was that I had brown hair in a community of mostly aryan-looking peoples.

However, after growing up and overindulging in my creative-leanings (by studying art and literature in college and receiving a degree with which I could barely wipe my ass), marrying and divorcing my bohemian Knight in shining Salvation Army Pants, and birthing my little miracle girl, I pretty much forgot what it was like to live in a paid-for house and not wonder how the electric bill was going to get paid each month.

I've been living below the poverty line for so long that all this world economic crisis stuff really doesn't affect me all that much. Still, I can always find something to complain about. In fact, I was just fretting the other day with my therapist. She did help me put things in perspective, though.

The conversation went something like this:

Me (flopping on leather couch, touching hand to head in dramatic Scarlett O'Hara fashion): "So, I am stressed about the state of the economy."

Judith (nodding, looking skeptically at me over half-moon Smart Lady Glasses):
"Ah. You lost money in your 401K?"

Me: "I... don't have a 401K."

Judith: "Mmmm. Your stock portfolio, then. How's that looking? Pretty bad, huh?"

Me: "Yeah. I don't have any stocks though."

Judith (smiling bemusedly): "Planning to retire any time soon?"

Me: "No. Okay, OK, I get it. It could always be worse".

Judith: "It could always be worse."

And it's true. I love my therapist. She gently reminds me on a regular basis that no matter how much my drama-queen brain tries to convince me of my own suffering, there are always people out there in more pain than me. And that's wicked comforting. I know I shouldn't say that, but it is.

Seriously, though. It's all about perspective.

Being poor helps me recognize what is really important, because really, I have no other choice. When you don't have money for stuff, you don't miss it that much because you forget what it was like to even have it in the first place. You following me?

Plus, if I wasn't poor, I could never even afford to go to therapy that I can get for free because of my kick-ass poor people health insurance. So, who am I to complain, really?

So, I don't know about you people, but I think I'm gonna stop my bitching and put my efforts into some other cause. Like figuring out how to rob the ATM down the street.
See you guys later.

T is for Tuesday and Totally sTupid

Wanna hear something? This is so typical of the way my week is going.

So, it's finally getting cool here. In fact, the last few nights have dipped into the low 50s; I'd say that's downright down-comforty. And yet, my cheap ass piece of shit building still hasn't turned the heat on. So, I get home tonight, tuck the kid all cozy in her bed, take a quick swim in the tub, and scamper all teeth-a-chatter into the kitchen, my brain on fire with another brilliant idea.

Now, I refuse to turn the oven on, generally, from May-September, because New York City is just too goddamned hot, and anything worth eating in summer is worth eating cold or raw, is my opinion. So tonight I think to myself, hey, I know. I'll bake something. And the kitchen will be filled with the delicious scent of sweet banana bread or brownies or some crap and I'll warm the apartment at the same time. Good. Yes.

Then I think, wait, you know, I'm really pretty lazy though. Why bake anything at all? Why not just turn the oven on 'broil' and get the house a little toasty, then shut it down, scoot my hiney under the covers and turn out the lights? Awwww, that's just crazy enough to work!

So I crank up the dial on the oven and wait for the magic to happen.

Only here's the thing. When a certain Babydaddy who shall remain nameless was staying at my apartment this weekend, he cooked something, and it spilled all over the inside of my oven.

I'm still not sure what was spilled. I'm thinking cheese, though he he swears up and down that he didn't spray-explode melted cheddar down the oven door, but within minutes of turning that fucker on, the entire kitchen was filled with the acrid smell of burnt asshair and a low-hanging gray smoke that made my eyes tear. Awesome. Good thing I disabled that annoying smoke alarm or else I'd have been dealing with that too.

So guess what I ended up having to do?

Open all the fucking windows.

And now I'm cold again.

October 15th Mercury starts spinning out of retrograde.

I'm just saying, is all.

Nightmare du jour

Why do I have such terrible dreams? I am starting to think that it's punishment for all the evil I do during my waking hours.

I had a dream last night that I was staying at my parents' house and was desperately horny and needing to masturbate. But I couldn't find a quiet place to set up my laptop and the door to my childhood bedroom had no lock. And Lily wouldn't give me 5 minutes to myself.

Then I had to kill a giant tiger with my bare hands. It was horrible, because it was big and scary and biting and scratching me and I was fighting for my life here, then I stabbed it in the heart with a stake.

I woke up covered in sweat and shaking and muttering to myself.

What could this possibly mean? Anyone?

Oh, and happy Monday. Whatever.

Some people think it's gross, but it's really good on toast

I was suffering on Tuesday from a terrible stomach virus. My poor belly felt like a giant clenched fist that was repeatedly getting stabbed with a sharp, splintered stake. Plus, I was shitting fire.

Lily had the day off from school, so I decided to call in to work so that I might recuperate. The ever-faithful Isabel was coming for a few hours to take the kid out to play so mommy could sleep, and Lil and I spent the morning laying about and taking it easy.

The two of us were sprawled on the carpet watching the Barbie movie for the umpteenth time (I rue the day I bought that piece of shit DVD), when suddenly I felt a giant gas bubble start demanding its release out my ass. So I simply let it go.

Except it wasn't a gas bubble.

It was all liquid, baby.

This is what my college friends and I used to call 'Oops Poops', since heavy drinking and heaping servings of nachos and mini cheeseburgers at 3 in the morning would sometimes produce this same effect. Mind you, for some of my friends. Never for me. Never, ever for me.

I think it's probably been a good 29 years since I shit my pants. In fact, I remember distinctly the last time...it was in first grade, and I was sitting on the cold tile floor of my classroom in the dark, watching a film strip about bugs on a rainy Friday. I needed to pass gas and instead totally squirted myself.

With heart-stopping horror I realized what I had done, but I popped a finger inside the waistband of my Wonder Woman undies to make sure.

Then I was sure.

I came away with a fingerful of poop and desperate not to be found out, quickly wiped it on the floor in front of me. I remember a couple of kids sniffing suspiciously and turning around and me kind of looking around too, like, "What disgusting pig would have shit their pants in FIRST GRADE?!?!"

Well, this incident the other day wasn't quite as embarrassing, since I was in my own living room, wearing my soft, comfy PJs, and was able to cup my hand under my behind and run to the bathroom where I quickly stripped and hurled myself into the shower.

"Mommy just had a little accident, baby! I'll be out in a second!" I sing-songed as I scrubbed myself raw.

This of course prompted Wee One to pad into the bathroom, where she spied my stained PJs and immediately cried, "MOMMY! Did you POOP your PANTS?!"

"It happens, honey," I called nonchalantly. "Even to grownups." I was determined not to make this a big deal. Whatevs, right? Everyone shits themselves sometimes. I'm certain of it.

I cleaned myself up, washed out the PJs and slipped into some soft sweats. The doorbell rang and it was our Isabel, there to save me.

Lily, The Informer, swung open the door and greeted her with, "Mama's not feeling very well today. She pooped in her pants."

I honestly don't know which experience is more humbling:
The stomach flu, or motherhood.

I wish it were Sunday, 'cause that's my fun day...

Happy Monday, folks. I'm keeping my fingers crossed for a better week, despite the solar system's personal vendetta against me.
Though that angry red planet is spinning furiously backwards and is determined to fuck up my world, I have the faith of a child in the tooth fairy that this week's gonna be better. If not, I'm blaming it on all of you.

Unfortunately, Monday is already off to a sorta crappy start...the city, which was so crisp and chilly and hopeful last week, with trees already starting to show hints of beautiful autumn colors, is back to sticky and gummy and warm and stinking like a bum's dirty hiney. Damn.

One of the loveliest things about fall in New York is that the stink of summer fades clean away when the air turns cool. Everything feels fresh, and there's a renewed hope and excitement in the air. So you can imagine my dismay when I climbed up from the bowels of the Union Square subway station only to meet with the stink of 100 dead hookers with vaginal infections, which lasted the better part of six blocks. Guess we have to wait another week for the freshmaker to return. September is a weird month. Hot, cold, fall, summer, make up your fucking mind! Jesus.

Anyway, I am not so easily discouraged. There are a million reasons I love fall in New York. For one thing, it's a great time to be in love. I look forward to holding hands in Central Park, cuddling up in a cafe with a hot spiced cider, watching the tourists flit up and down 5th Avenue looking for Trump Fucking Tower. It's the beginning of a very happy season here in my fair, fair city. People are just nicer to each other when they aren't sweating their balls off and having to endure the smell of three months worth of garbage piling up in the streets.

I'm putting on a happy face. I'd appreciate a little support, for once.

Mercury in Retrograde hair

I've decided that instead of blaming my many shortcomings as a human being on simply being an exhausted single mama with a full-time job, every time I fuck something up from now until October 15th, I'm going to say simply, "Oh well, it's because Mercury is in retrograde".

So, for the next several weeks, those close to me can look forward to viewing my new fashion trend of semi-dreadlocked Princess Leia hair and forgetting to iron my pants.

Also, I will be forgetting your birthdays and anniversaries. You're welcome.
Plus, if you're really really lucky, you might even get a wine-soaked, passionate and disjointed email or Facebook message from me telling me how much I love you and how sorry I am for being such a crappy friend/daughter/sister/girlfriend. Because that's the kind of girl I am.

It's super duper liberating to have someone else to blame for the shitty things I do on a daily basis anyway!

I heart the solar system.

Coffee with MILF

Good morning, lovelies. Oh, how I have missed you, one and all. Well, most of you. Some of you.

It seems the more interesting my personal life gets, the less captivating my blog entries become. One might argue, then, that my life must always have been a great fascinating trip, and to that person I would say Sit and Spin. I mean, really. That's just not nice.

I'm riding the Jittery Starbucks Express this morning, as as I've already had helping number 2 and it's just 8 am. Also, I'm now keeping a secret stash of chocolate-covered espresso beans in my desk and on my person at all times; these are my secret weapon, the Mom-equivalent of coke bumps or little hits from a meth pipe. Yummmmm. I will henceforth have the beans ever-at-the-ready, since Mama is running on fumes to get through a day of work, shrink appointment, and evening PTA meeting. I fucking do it all.

It's funny. My life is so different than what I'd have expected it to be. And yet, I have to say, I am really pretty pleased with the way things seem to be turning out. Though I've never been one to buy into fairy-tale bullshit, I am starting to believe that Happily Ever After can be just about anything you decide it's gonna be.

On Monday I put my John Hancock on the papers that will officially dissolve a marital union of almost ten years. A union that I am more and more surprised lasted as long as it did, and should probably never, ever have been in the first place. Though my marriage to Shawn was not a bad time. And it yielded our amazing Lily Alice, so I'm more convinced that everything in this life happens for a reason.

There was no ceremony, no sentimental tears, no "Fuck You"s. We signed the papers, rode home together in a cab and had dinner as a family. We held hands before a meal of sushi takeout and said grace (Lily: "Thank you god for the trees and birds, and for the food on the table, and for Jesus on the table"), then listened to Coldplay and danced around the kitchen and took video of Lily doing performance art on the counter in nothing but a hippie beaded necklace and her faux fur coat (and no, she did not look like a baby prostitute, it was more of a Jim Morrison effect).

What I'm saying, folks, is that life goes on. The road twists and bends and sometimes there are giant cracks in it and sometimes you fucking fall into them, but you know, you eventually climb on out. the Universe has a plan. There is always a plan.

Me and BabyDaddy are going to raise our daughter to be a wonderful, creative, strong and gentle contributor to society (and one who hopefully won't get anymore time outs for pinching a classmate at kindergarten...wtf???), and that's how it's gonna be.

I'm hopeful. Today, I'm really hopeful.

Little Horrible

I don't know what I did to get on Jesus's shit list, but that vindictive bastard is out to get me lately.

I didn't blog much this week because I was afraid that if I sat down to type, I'd only be able to vomit forth a rancorous froth of bitterness and hatred, and nobody wants to bother reading that.

But hey, I missed you guys, so fuck it.

Goddamn, though. My weekdays have been passing by in a mindfucking blur, making me feel like an arthritic gerbil on a wheel whose been given an excess of caffeine and several hits of bad acid.

Mornings are especially shiteous. I think I would prefer some old school torture, served up prison-camp style – say, bamboo shoots under the nails, or perhaps a searing hot enema – to what I had to endure this morning.

My day started at 5 am. That's right, fuckers, 5 in the frigging morning.
I was pummelled awake by two freezing feet in my stomach. These horrid little appendages were attached to the miniature czar of my home environment, whose demands for orange juice and magic markers before the sun is even up makes me realize why all my pubic hair is turning gray. (Two words, darlings: Brazillian Wax.)

Of course, some mornings go better than others. Lily is, generally, a great kid with an even temperament. Often she will get herself dressed, eat some breakfast without complaint, even brush her teeth with only a little help from me.

But. Today, that was so not the case.

This morning my little dust bunny opted for a white-hot scream-athon while alternately laying on the bed like a broken marionette, and writhing on the floor like an epileptic. All the while Mommy ran about like a freaked-out, headless chicken, fetching two sets of clothing and smearing lipstick across my face and trying in vain to choke some coffee down my dang throat.

You have no idea how much ass it can truly suck to be me sometimes.
But, well, I just told you, so now you do. And I kind of feel better. Thanks!

It's times like these, though, that we really must stop and remember that some people have real problems.

I could be riding out the aftermath of Hurricane Ike in a church with a lion. My home could be leveled. I could have lost a ton of invested (ha ha!) money in the collapsing world economy. I could be Sarah Palin's retarded baby. It could be worse. It always could be worse.

Here's a joke:

Why did the cop smell?

Because he was on duty.

OMGLOLLOLLOLLOLROFLMFAO!!!!!!

Kindergarten Chronicles, Part I

Oh, Christ. I so didn't want this to turn into one of those lame ass Mommy Blogs. But sometimes I have to share. Because the shit Lily says is funny.

Since she started kindergarten, Lily's and my evening dinner exchanges have gotten more and more interesting. Also, more random.

Sample dinner conversation 1:

Lil: I had a great day.

Mom: That's great, baby. How come?

Lil: I can't tell you. I'm......concentrating.

Conversation 2:

Lil: I get to be the lollipop fairy at school all week.

Mom: Really? What's the lollipop fairy do?

Lil: Well, we get to help Monique (the teacher) and pick one boy to be the boy lollypop fairy. I picked Alexander V. He is sooooo nice to me. Sometimes he is mean to other people and he gets time outs. But not to me. I am in looooove with him.

Mom: Love? Really. Wow. What's it like to be in love?

Lil: Well, we're going to be best friends forever. Until 5th grade. Also, Tiffany wants to be in love with Alexander V., but I am in love with him. He pulls his socks up to his knees. That's how I wear my socks now.

(5 minutes later)

Lil: Who did I say I was in love with, again?

Conversation 3 (bedtime):

Lil: Guess what I want to be for Halloween?

Mom: (sighs wearily): Let me guess. Cinderella again?

Lil: No, a pumpkin!!!

Mom: Awesome! Grandma and I will totally make you a costume!!! We can get orange tights, and paint your face...

Lil: Actually, No...I think instead I want to be a potato.

Stay tuned, y'all.

You're gonna make it after all

This morning I was startled awake from a dream about the Manson family by a little finger poking me in the eyelid and a sleepy voice asking, "Mama? What is water made of?"

I sat upright, wiped a thread of drool from my the corner of my mouth, and squinted at the rumply-haired little imp laying next to me.

"Who the fuck are you?" I asked.

No, just kidding.

Seriously, folks. Here we have illustrated just another reason why it is not advisable to drink wine on a Thursday night. It's never, ever worth the upset of the following morning. By that I mean: allowing your almost-5 year old to dress herself and leave the house looking like one of those children on the UNICEF box, forgetting her backpack and having to ask your friend's husband to throw two bucks down from the window of their third-floor apartment so that she can buy lunch, and spending most of the subway commute trying to shake off the sheen of Shitty Mothering that glistens all over you like dayglo body paint.

It's okay though, because when I got off the subway this morning, a happy girly song came on my ipod and I strutted across 5th Avenue and smiled up at the Flatiron building pretending to be Marlo Thomas or Mary Tyler Moore or Meredith Grey and suddenly I felt happy and flitty and pretty and it was all sort of okay. It's almost the weekend and I can spend time drawing with the kid and playing Polly Pockets and snuggling on the couch and take her to a birthday party at a farm and put on my gold cowboy boots and help her feed a goat and everything will be okey-dokey. I can feel it in my old, brittle bones.

Happy Friday, bitches.

Mwah.

I heart my co-workers

This was in my inbox yesterday.



I supposed I invite this. If I didn't plaster my goddamned face all over the internet, it wouldn't be so easy for certain someones to create (marginally) clever visuals at my expense.

Some people just have too much time on their hands.

Collection Agency Fun

I don't know why I answer the phone when the caller ID says "Unknown Name". Maybe I'm a masochist. Maybe I'm just curious like a cat, and I simply can't help myself. But here's one of the super fun things about getting divorced:
You no longer are responsible for your ex-husband's heaping, endless mountains of debt.

So. You're sitting on the couch, staring at the wall, wiping smeared tears from your eyes because you've just gone through the whole first-day-of-kindergarten thing all over again (long story short, she got into an even awesomer school, so you quick-like yanked her from the first awesome school, knowing the upheaval would have temporary repercussions, but that it would be totally worth it). Oh, also you really have no idea how you're going to get her to school every day and arrive at work on time, and you really can't be late for work, and you feel like you don't have a friend in the world, and the weight of responsibility on your bony shoulders is bearing down like a ton of motherfucking bricks.

Then, the day brightens.

Brrrring!

Kristin: Hello?

Telephone: Hello, is Mr. Shawn _____ there?

Kristin, Um, who's calling?

Telephone: Nikki.

Kristin: Hello, Nikki. Nikki from where?

Nikki: (pause). From Houston.

Kristin: Um, no, Nikki. I meant, what company are you with?

Nikki: Red Line.

Kristin: Okay. Is that a collection agency?

Nikki: No.

Kristin: No?

Nikki: Is Mr. Shawn there?

Kristin: No. Mr. Shawn is no longer residing here. You can reach him at xxx-xxx-xxxx.

Nikki: (Recites back an entirely wrong number)...is that correct?

Kristin: No. X....X....X.....X.....X....X......

Nkki: Got it.

Kristin: Really?

Nikki: Yes. Thank you so much for your help.

Kristin: No, Nikki. Thank you.

The end of an era. Sniff.

Well, it's finally official.

After several summers of blowing off the threats, Coney Island is finally conceding to the big bad condo tycoons and closing Astroland for good. On SUNDAY.

This seems rather sudden, and as a result, I find it jarring and I don't really know how to react.

Thankfully, I got my fill of giant, bong-sized frozen Pina Coladas on the boardwalk, tattooed midgets at the sideshow, and needle-sticks on the beach to last me quite a long time. The memories will keep me warm at night as we enter into the cold, cold winter without Astroland.

So, I leave you with this fuzzy memory. Also, it has a gratuitous boob shot. So stop complaining that I don't do anything for you.

Happy weekend, sex perverts!



PS I was just told that this freaking embed isn't working. So if you want to see the boobs video, click here.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e6C18nn6k8k

Thanks, John.

Putting the "Street" in "Street Festival"

What a weekend. So there was this street festival in Astoria yesterday. Anyone even remotely acquainted with me knows that Mama is a sucker for a NYC street festival.
I'm drawn like a mosquito to a bug zapper. Simply cannot help myself. There is so much wonderful shit on which to waste my cash, I usually have to replenish funds at an ATM at least once during the 10-block walk through Street Vendor Heaven.

When I'm at one of these time-wasters, I get sorta posessed. My heart pumps, I feel that sting of ammonia thrill in my nostrils, my pupils dilate with excitement. The hippie incense smell, the scores of knockoff handbags, the piles of cheap, hand-woven Guatemalan sweaters, the fried dough, the fresh watermelon souring in the scorching sun...oh, OH...it's almost too much to bear.

Yesterday's Labor Day Street Fair was no disappointment. There were FOUR jumpy castles, all roasting in the relentlessly hot sun, waiting for shoeless children to hop in and get third-degree burns on their feet. Also present were three dusty, tired old ponies, penned into a tiny riding ring on a side street. My friend's dad, a street musician, crooned into a microphone in the middle of 30th Avenue, his guitar case sitting open at his feet in the hopes of making his rent money. It was so cool.

There were even two sleepy-looking, life-sized cartoon characters in cheap, baggy costumes, standing in front of the fish market to shake hands with the little ones. Awwww. Though Spider-man and Winnie the Pooh were of no interest to Lily, who was more interested in scoring cheap plastic bootleg Korean toys and extra ice cream, we did take notice of one family who felt it imperative to force their little boy to stand next to Spidey so his 800 lb mama could snap a precious picture.

This kid, maybe he was five? Was thoroughly freaked out. He clung tightly to his mother as she continually peeled his arms from around her legs and tried to attach them to Spider-man, as if he were one of those hanging monkey toys with the long arms and velcro hands. It was disturbing to watch.

When the little fucker finally relented and sagged back, tear-stained and defeated, into Spidey's waiting arms, his mom got her precious photo, and the family started to move on.

But not before Little Maniac Boy hurled himself into his mother and yelled in her face, "YOU ARE AN ASSHOLE!!!!"

To which, his mother burst out laughing.

I think I need to find a new place to live soon.

For your three days of debauchery and holiday fun

Happy Weekend, M'lovlies.
Don't go breakin my heart.

Mmmmkay?