Bread Crumbs In The Butter

Meme time! Six (Just six?) Quirky Things

It's been forever since someone tagged me in a meme!  Okay, well maybe not that long, but it's probably been a whole whack of time since I actually completed one I was tagged in.

Cristina over at Homeslice tagged me in this one and I'm happy to oblige.

The Rules
* Link to the person who tagged you.
* Mention the rules.
* Tell six quirky yet boring, unspectacular details about yourself.
* Tag six other bloggers by linking to them.
* Go to each person’s blog and leave a comment to let them know that they’ve been tagged.

So, here we go:

1. Please don't try to load my dishwasher.  What will happen is I will hover over you, rub my hands together, turn my feet in and bite my tongue. After you're done, I will wait 43 seconds before I do it again, the way I like to have it done.
2. I have a very serious, never mess with, shower routine. I check to be sure my supplies are stocked and then I shower my parts in a very strict order. If I screw it up, I will start over. Surprisingly though, I'm an extremely fast showerer.
3. I'm not crazy about my food touching. If everything is sort of "autonomous" (meaning solid and not runny), it can all go on the same plate and even touch a little bit. But, I will never, ever eat salad on my dinner plate and have the dressing get everywhere. Baked beans with my breakfast? Yeah, in their own bowl!
4. I have cereal every night before bed, but I rarely have cereal for breakfast.  Multi-Grain Cheerios and Mini Wheats (just regular, not that strawberry crap, yuck!) are my nightly faves, but I'll eat Sugar Crisp or Honey Bunches Of Oats too. 
5. I always, always have an elastic around my wrist. I have lots of hair and as much as I try to wear it down, it inevitably ends up on top of my head at some point. Oh, and the elastics are always black, or maybe brown. Pink and purple elastics just won't do.
6. Everything has to be just right for me to go to bed. The bed has to be properly made, there has to be a fan on and I have to read or watch TV before I can doze off. I'm very jealous of John who just hops in to bed and is asleep 13 seconds later.

So there we have it.  Blog fodder and more boring things than you really wanted to know I bet.  I have to tag five people now, which I probably don't have a right to do because I haven't read or commented on any blogs recently, so if you feel like letting me know how crazy you are, have at it!

Real Moms

Elizabeth tagged me in the "Real Moms" meme last week.  A meme where you use "Real Moms" as a writing prompt and go from there.

So I sat down to write it last night. And I sat. And I stared. And then I went to bed and racked my brain.  So many cool moms have come up with fantastic perspectives on what real moms are like.

Some of the directions I've gone and thought better of:

Real Moms ... cry in the bathroom when no one can hear them, because they're worried, sad or just plain tired. I thought that was too negative and mostly just reflective of recent events and not necessarily my entire life as a Mom.

Real Moms ... get angry. They yell, snarl and sometimes even curse at or in the general direction of their kids. Real Moms get just plain pissed off that their kids just don't get that we do the same thing every day. Nothing changes. Clear the table. Bring me your laundry. Get ready for school without stopping to play Littlest Pet Shop in the hall.  I chucked that one, because again, it was too negative and had more to do with the sit-down I had to have with Kristyn and Erin to get them back on track after a March Break of laziness.

Real Moms ... get drunk and then barf out the truck on Dwyer Hill Road. I know, it's gross and shameful, but I did this on Saturday. I do it once in a while to remind myself why I don't drink that much on a regular basis.  I pitched this one because no one wants to read a post about me tossing my arroz con pollo at 80km/hour.

Real Moms ... enjoy sex with their husbands. Yeah, I said it. Every second night is our usual target and the more spontaneous the better. I like sex. I enjoy sex. And I insist on "enjoying it" a few times, if you get what I mean. I didn't make this my prompt because that's pretty much all I have to say about my sex life. It's good. End of story.

Real Moms ... worry they're making the wrong decision, a lot.  Should both girls play competitive soccer? Should Erin return to dance next year when she's clearly not getting what she wants out of it? Should the girls go to Catholic high school one town over or switch to public and stay here in Almonte? Should we restart speech therapy for Alex even though he tended to regress with the therapist?  Should we shell out the money for private therapy? Should I start waxing my eyebrows? Get the mole on my face removed even though it's been my signature feature for thirty years? It's growing hair and well ... ew.  That one went to the basket because my facial hair is not something I want to devote a whole post to. Yet.

So ... it hit me this morning. As I yelled at my kids to hurry up, plucked a stray hair, remarked that my stomach finally feels better and told John just how on he was last night;

Real Moms are just making it through the day and basically have no idea what they're doing. It's not like some of us gave birth and just knew what to do. You know that Mom you're so jealous of? The one who has it together and makes it look easy?  She's not real. She may not make it as obvious as you, but she has her thing. The thing that keeps her up at night on the verge of tears. She looks forward to grocery shopping alone like she used to look forward to clubbing till 5am and she's not sorry. Real Moms want a nap and someone to clean the house. Know what though?  Real Moms love being Moms, no matter how negative they might portray it. They feel challenged and loved and find creativity in their children in ways impossible to explain.

Real Moms simple enjoy being real.

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Now I get to tag five people:  Jay, Sherry, Anna, Dani and Jana when she gets home from her trip.

I am musicale

I was tagged by Ali in a music meme and it couldn't be timed better.

John, the kids and I went to Syracuse, NY for three days this March Break. We shopped and swam in the hotel pool, basically forgetting this house was at all here for a while.

Look what I got myself, on a whim at the Carousel Mall...

My SONY WALKMAN MP3 players sucked giant ass. I couldn't download paid for music onto it, because of some sort of blockage. The only way I could buy music online and put it on there was to use their site, of which I cannot because I am Canadian, or burn the music onto a CD and I don't have a CD burner (but I did manage to put a shitload of unpaid for music on it!).  Moral here - always go with the iPod first.

Anyhow, now I'm downloading tunes like crazy and LOVING it! What have I put on besides the tunes I will list below? Lots of 90s stuff, which is sad, but cool. Jane's Addiction, Sublime, Cranberries, Marilyn Manson, Rage Against The Machine. Stuff I love to run to.

So I am happy to do this meme (and I have to get to the one Elizabeth tagged me in too!)

Instructions: List seven songs you are into right now. No matter what they are. They must be songs you are presently enjoying.  Then tag seven other people to see what they’re listening to.

So here are the tunes I've been enjoying lately:

1. Keep The Car Running, Arcade Fire
2. Maneater, Nelly Furtato
3. Survivalism, Nine Inch Nails
4. Read My Mind, Killers/Pet Shop Boys Remix (Holyfreakingshit is it awesome!)
5. Wind It Up, Gwen Stefani
6. Anna Molly, Incubus
7. We Danced Together, The Rakes

I want to link you to this music, and I will, but I had a whole bottle of wine last night while out with many people, including Moyra and Jay and today I feel, a bit, well... totally hungover. I'm too old to be hungover.  I blame it on the Irish. And Moyra. And the comic at Yuk Yuk's.

And, and tagging others. Let's see... Alison, Mrs Chicken, Megin, Melissa, Amanda, Katherine and Jess

Junk Drawer

Junk Drawer

This week's Show and Tell is "Junk Drawer".  I typed "Drunk Jawer" three times.

It was hard for me to pick just one, since I have several. In fact, most of the drawers in this house are stuffed full of junk.  When you come into this house you might think it's clean, but I am serious when I say "Don't open anything that is closed."

What do we have in this drawer?  I see a jazz shoe, the cover to my Grey's Anatomy DVD, a pizza menu, sandpaper, measuring taps, batteries for my MP3 player, an IKEA wall hook, an ugly silver basket given to us as a wedding gift and tonnes of credit card bills I probably didn't pay.

Click the photo to see the next picture of the kids junk drawer - actully, it's a closet.

Show and Tell is brought to you by Blackbird. This week, she chose my idea!

Free Day

Today is a freebie day for me.  I've been so stressed lately and I've been working so much that I gave up.  It's Meghan's 3 day school week (we do full day K in the country, 2 full days one week, 3 full days the next), so with the three girls gone, I only have Alex.  We're gonna spend the morning watching TV in bed, have a little lunch and then go to Costco and hit a Bell store so I can get a new cell phone. (That's another story. An angry one. Today is happy happy happy!).  That's my plan for today. Tonight I'm drinking beer with John and watching PVRed episodes of The Apprentice and America's Next Top Model.

Speaking of freebies, I've seen discussion of "The Freebie List" going around of late.  Remember the episode of Friends with Ross and Rachel's Top Five?  I'd like to see who my friends are into. 

My list is ever changing. Some come and go as their lives take turns I just can't support (Ben Affleck, I'm looking at you and your J-Lo phase here.)  Others get too old, too bloated, too crazy!

As of today, this is my Top Five List of Freebies.  They are in no particular order. The last thing you want to say when facing one of them is "Hey, you're NUMBER 4 on my list, wanna do it?"

• Ian Thorpe (anyone who's nickname is The Thorpedo is a given, right? And if you say he's gay, you die)
• Ben Affleck (pre and post J-Lo)
• Hugh Jackman
• Eric Bana
• Vince Vaughn

Alternates and honourable mentions; Clive Owen, John Cusack and Patrick Dempsey (ever since Can't Buy Me Love -"You have the best rododendruns in town")

And you?  Who would you do?

Tagged Just A Little Bit

There are worse things than getting tagged by a luscious Mom to four like Anna (another crazy sex monster - dude, she flashes her husband daily!). Last night my soccer team played the first place team (we're #10) and we won. We totally won. It was a rough game though and my right hand really hurts. So the less typing I have to do to come up with a good post, the better.

Here is the "game" and how it goes:

Here are the rules; the first player of this game starts with the topic. Five weird habits of yourself and people who get tagged need to write an entry about their five weird habits as well as state this rule clearly. In the end, you need to choose the next five people to be tagged and link to their web journals. Don’t forget to leave a comment in their blog or journal that says “You are tagged” (assuming they take comments) and tell them to read yours.

Mine are:

1. I cannot get into an unmade bed. I have to remove all sheets and blankets and put them back in their proper order.  If, during the night, I feel like the sheets have moved out of place too much, I will get back up and make the bed again.

2. I have to load the dishwasher just so. Everything has a place. All knives must go in blade down. All plates must face the cutlery.  Anyone can empty my dishwasher, but nobody, and I mean nobody can load it.

3. All of my furniture and knick knacks must be equal. One of our couches is on a half wall with pillars above it. I took out a measuring tape and ensure that the middle couch cushion was in the exact centre of the middle pillar. I also made sure the end tables were the exact same distance from the edge of the half wall.  Until I did that, I couldn't concentrate on the TV.

4. In a restaurant, I have to be able to see everything. I prefer to sit against the wall. Mostly because I love to people watch. Also because I like to make sure no waitresses spill food on my head - which has happened.

5. I never ever ever wear white socks unless I am at the gym or running. This is ESPECIALLY true if I am wearing jeans and black/brown/any colour shoes. White socks outside an exercise setting is just wrong ... WRONG.

Okay, so who should I tag?

Laura, Angie (she's got a bumpy tummy, go say congrats!), Stephanie, Angel and Deanna

LET YOUR FREAK FLAG FLY!