Weekend Update! Homecoming edition...

And here it is, 9:55 on Saturday evening. I'm sitting at my desk listening to Henry and Cosmo bark at something outside. I'm drinking a nice glass of Kenwood Cab. 12 is playing on my phone in the front room, hubby is watching college football and I'm playing on FB after uploading 15's pics from Homecoming.

At long last, the day is over and I can relax. I decided to skip the yard sale this morning. But everything else can be successfully checked off the Saturday to-do list along with about 4 loads of laundry as an added bonus.

Here are a few pics of my gorgeous 15 in her mother-approved dress.

My gorgeous 15.

The lovely 15 & 12.

Ready to head to dinner and the dance with her friends.

I am NOT actually that short, she's in like, 4" heels. I'm 5'2" she's 5'8"

See I told you.

Crazy Busy Weekend!

Homecoming weekend. Here it is, at long last. 15 is lucky to have made it all week without missing the bus once. We picked up her dress last night and got a bitchin' pair of heels and an adorable little clutch to go with the heels. In these heels she's officially 'an assload' taller than I am. I promise an update tomorrow night when I get the pictures of her all dressed up and ready to go.

In the mean time, tonight is the Homecoming football game. And since 15 is in the band, she's performing during the game. And since the band boosters run the concession stand, and I'm a band booster, I'll be slinging nachos and cheese, hotdogs and popcorn all evening. It's a fantastic program where we earn money for the band and some of the proceeds that the concession stand earns goes into an account for each child of a parent who volunteers to work the stand. I try to sign up and work concessions whenever I am free (no volleyball, no late evening practices, etc) and last year I did end up with a halfway decent amount in 15's account which helped offset the cost of her stay at band camp this summer (stop now. No American Pie jokes. This is my daughter we're talking about. And besides, she doesn't even play the flute).

Anyway I digress (you see that happening a lot with me, don't you?). I'll be working concessions while 15 is out marching and playing.  The stand is actually a lot of fun. One of my favorite people to work with is Keith Stone, who is so smooth. She knows who she is.  But getting back to the band, this band is fantastic. I mean truly a talented and amazing group of kids. I'm so pleased to be associated with them. They were even invited to march in the annual Cherry Blossom Festival parade in Washington, DC this coming April. They are only one of a handful of bands from across the country  invited to march in this parade so we're all pretty freaking stoked.

So that's tonight.

Tomorrow 15's got a cross country meet and we've got our community yard sale. Perfect excuse to dig out all the shit we've got piled up in the basement and sell it to some poor unsuspecting schmuck  sweet, kind folks. Better in their basement than mine. Then I'm getting a haircut at 1:00. THEN we've got a chicken barbeque dinner to benefit our University's womens basketball team. We love those girls and they have been so sweet and kind to my daughters that we like to try to help them out whenever we can.

After we eat our bbq, it's time to get 15 ready for Homecoming, which means she gets her shower, puts on her pretty $29.99 dress that cost me $127 (don't forget the shoes and the clutch!!) and she gets to go to her dance because she did NOT miss the bus this week.

Now we move on to Sunday after a good night's sleep on Saturday night. Sunday the girls have RE (religious education for you non-church-goers). Don't feel left out, I'm not a church-goer myself but sometimes you do what will please the grandparents AND appease the children. THEN I'm going for a nice run with my friend Shrek. I am her Donkey. It's a win-win. Shrek and Donkey jogging along. No better way to spend a Sunday morning.

Sunday afternoon we've got basket bingo, once again to benefit those awesome women who play basketball for our University. Sunday evening will be topped off with a youth mass and pot luck dinner for all the kids who are planning to make their confirmation (15 & 12 are included in that lot). Sunday, after I get home, kick off my shoes and sit on the couch, I plan on popping open a nice bottle of red and maybe trying to get to the bottom of it.

I've told you about my weekend plans. Now, what have YOU got going on this weekend? Last weekend of yard work? Golfing? Bowling? Are YOU yard-sale-ing? Wanna come to my house and buy my junk awesome stuff??

Homecoming Dress (a Mother's Nightmare)

I love 15. I truly do. And I trust her to make good choices as she grows. She's a great kid, she's smart, she's funny as hell, she's drop dead gorgeous and to paraphrase her favorite boy band, One Delusion (or something like that) she doesn't know she's beautiful. (here's where I wait for her to read and correct me)

Anyway, that being said, she went shopping on Friday night with two girlfriends for dresses for Homecoming which is next Saturday. I had plans with the moms in my 'hood, and her dad was working, so one of the girls'  moms took them out to the mall. 15 had said that this mom would be fine with paying for a dress for 15 if I wanted her to, and I could just pay her back. While it was a really nice and very generous offer, I politely declined, telling 15 that if she did find a dress, put it aside or ask them to hold it and I would take her back up Saturday and buy it. OR she could take her own birthday money and use it to buy a dress. She took her money and off they went.

Fast forward to about 8:00 that night. I was well into a bottle of wine, having fun with the moms, playing Pokeno and enjoying a moms night out. 15 sent me a picture text, but nothing came through. I texted her back and she said "Did you see it?" Seeing nothing but a big white screen on my phone I texted back that I didn't see it. So she called me and told me that she had tried on this 'really pretty cream colored dress and it was only $34 and she could buy it herself and it was really pretty and can I get it?' After a little more discussion, and knowing that it would save me the trouble of driving up the next day to buy it, I agreed. She of course gave me the standard: "Thank you! I love you mommy!" schpeal and hung up. Several minutes later, the picture came through. I nearly died.

While I do have a foul mouth at times, I'm not a big proponent of posting pictures of scantily clad women on my blog. And ESPECIALLY not pictures of those to whom I've given birth. So you can imagine my shock and awe when I saw that this dress looked like, in my husband's words: a scrunchy. It WAS in fact cream colored, flesh colored to be more precise. Strapless. Form fitting (read: TIGHT) and about 6 inches too short. This was the conversation, verbatim that I had with 15 after the picture came through and I had sufficiently lost my mind:

Me: Did you already buy it?

4 seconds go by without a reply

Me: DID YOU ALREADY BUY IT???????

15: Yes I did

Me: Save the receipt, don't dare take the tags off!!!

I got home from moms night out and when I went into 15's room she was already asleep. I looked at the dress hanging innocently in her closet and threw up. This thing looked like an ace bandage, only smaller. If I let her wear this dress this year, next year's dress would very likely be down to bandaids on her nips and possibly a fig leaf (optional, I'm sure) Do you know WHY this dress was only $34 at Macy's??? Because even the hookers knew it was too small and too tight.

Don't go getting all up in my grill about my comparison of my 15 year old to a hooker, because that's not what I'm saying at all. I'm saying her choice of homecoming dresses just needed some guidance. When I asked if her friend's mom had seen the dress, she replied that no, the mom had not. Saturday 15 had an away cross country met and then we had a houseful of kids Saturday evening, so I never actually got to talk with her about her clothing choices. However, Sunday morning, we discussed it. Or more accurately, I asked her to put the dress on so that I could see it in person. Maybe the picture didn't do it justice. Maybe it looked better on her in person. Maybe my dogs would develop the ability to calculate nuclear physics too.

When she came downstairs with this dress on, my jaw hit the floor. Yes, she's drop dead gorgeous. Yes, she has a great figure. But NO way in HELL was she wearing this rubber band to Homecoming. So I explained in my most soothing, caring, loving mom voice that she is a beautiful girl but that dress sends the wrong message. I know she's a decent kid, I know she's got morals and isn't loose or trampy, but that dress says otherwise. Yes, all of her friends know her and know she's not a tramp but what about those who DON'T know her? Will they be quick to judge? And while I do teach my kids that it doesn't matter what others think of you, as long as you know in your heart that you're a good person, I had to be a hypocrite this one time and rule a big HELL NO to this particular item of clothing. So sue me.

So Sunday afternoon, 15, her bestie M, hubby and I headed back up to Macy's to return the scrunchy. We then went to every single store in the mall in search of a more appropriate dress for homecoming. And we came up completely empty handed. Deb, Charlotte Russe, Penney's, you name it we searched it and found nothing that 15 liked. Leaving the mall, I was sweating, my heart was pounding, and I'm thinking, great now she's going to have to wear last year's dress again and she'll be in therapy for years and write a tell-all book about what a rotten and judgemental mother I am. But there was one option, and while I wasn't IN LOVE with it, it WAS an option.

David's Bridal. There was one right across from the mall and I thought, other than an assload of cash, what have we got to lose by taking a look. Our lovely bridal shopping consultant, Fey, picked a bunch of pretty dresses for 15 to try on. And BAM! After an hour and 10 minutes and 42 dresses, we had a winner. It is a really gorgeous royal blue, somewhat form-fitting but not hookerish dress. The price was marked down from $99 to $59. Okay I can live with $59. Except that it was a scad too loose at the top and 15's girls would be making surprise appearances all night if we didn't get it altered. So Fey took us back to alterations where we met the lovely Michelle, who was sweet and kind and told us that the alterations would be $50, PLUS $15 because of the extra material that had to be cut off the top of the dress. Oh and PLUS $25 because it was a rush job (alterations usually allow for 2 weeks, we only had one week, so BAM, another $25). I must admit that the dress is beautiful, 15 is a knock out in it, and it covers more of her body than the damn paper towel that we returned to Macy's, so I said 'Okay, let's do it' which got the standard "Thank you mommy, I love you" from 15.

Last surprise. When we finally made it to the register to pay, Michelle rang up the alterations ($90) and when she scanned the price tag for the dress, it came up $29 NOT $59. BONUS! So the alterations were 3 times the price of the dress. But the dress, all told, came to $127, and to me, that's well worth the cost of having 15's girls and her hoo haa covered up. I'll put up a picture on the day of the dance.

How I Spent My Saturday

So this morning, the crazywhackjobnazirunningho neighbor invited us to go for a bike ride on the C & O Canal in Maryland near our little bustling burg. So the husband and I happily donned our helmets, packed a lunch and pumped up the tires. 15 was at a cross country meet and 12 was at a Red Cross babysitter training course. From here in town to Harpers Ferry, it's close to a 15 mile bike ride along the absolutely gorgeous canal. Gorgeous scenery. Excellent company. And one extremely sore ass.

I don't have padded bike shorts. Now, I DO have an enormous ass, lots of extra padding down there, but apparently fat, while a great insulator against the cold, does NOTHING to cushion the constant bumps, rocks, tree roots and various branches that my bike encountered. Imagine, the National Park Service did NOT do a clean sweep of the canal prior to my 15 mile-one-way bike ride. The nerve.

So we got down to our destination, parked the bikes and broke out the grub. We watched some completely INSANE guys repelling down the side of the mountain at Maryland Heights. We watched a ton of tourists going over the walkway bridge to the historic park on the West Virginia side. We passed a group of horseback riders enjoying the beauty of the day and the amazing views of the area where the Potomac and Shenandoah Rivers converge. And my ass was sore.

After we finished sandwiches and snacks, we mounted our bikes for the 15 mile trek back to town. And the real pain started. I gave birth to two children via C-section (not today, stay with me here). With 15, I was in labor for 19 hours and never dilated beyond 6 cm. I 'hee hee hee hoo hoo hoo'd' for 19 hours trying hard NOT to squeeze her out because she'd end up looking like she was coming out of the Play-Doh fun factory.  They finally took her via C-section, thank God. Not trying to get all gross on you, just stating the fact that I had labor pain and a sore vajay-jay. But this ass pounding that I took was pretty freaking close on the pain scale to that labor pain.

I was within 4 miles of home and had to get off my bike and walk, I could not take the pain anymore. I walked for about a half mile and then got back up on the bike. It really IS like riding a bike. You don't forget how. And you don't forget the ass-pain.

That's all I've got for today. I'd blog more but I've gotta go ice my ass.

Followers?

So here is a question for all 33 of you who are 'Followers' of my blog. I quit Google+ because I'm an idiot and couldn't get the hang of it. I don't know if being on Google+ has anything at all to do with being a Snarkfest Follower, and I'm not exactly sure what happens when you BECOME a follower. Can one of you (there are 33 of you, I'm really hoping SOMEONE can) tell me what exactly happens when you become a Follower? Do you get my blog delivered hot and fresh to your door (email?) or in your reader? I know that if you go to 'Subscribe via Email' using the 'Subscribe' widget, it goes through Feedburner and you have to enter your email address, and then you have to confirm using the link Feedburner sends you, but what exactly do you get when you 'Follow'? Anyone? Can anyone tell me?

Four Plus an Angel

If you are a parent, and you have spawn that make you want to rip your hair out in clumps and throw it at them, if you have children who push and push and push you to the brink of sanity, make you yell
and scream like a lunatic, if you wonder if they will survive to adulthood without you putting them through the nearest wall, I urge you to read this.  This is Jessica's story. Jessica writes the blog Four Plus An Angel, which I just found today thanks to Nicole over at Ninja Mom.

Last night 15 made me absolutely insane. She found every button I have and pushed them so hard I felt like she had me jacked up against a wall. And I lashed out at her. Badly. I screamed, yelled, cursed, grabbed her face in my hands, all to try to get through to her. And now, after reading Jessica's blog, I regret my behavior. 15 is 15, it's who she is. It's not she who must change, it is I who must adapt. I'm sorry I flipped out on her. I'm sorry I lost my temper and appeared to be a monster, because I'm sure that's how she saw me. But this morning, I still had her in my life. And I will cherish her and try to hold onto every moment I have with her, good or bad. Because not all of us are that lucky.

Happy Birthday, Jessica.

Liebster Award! For me!?

Thanks to that sexy, saucy minx over at Sassy Quest, I've been awarded the Liebster Award. It's quite an honor, and while I have no idea what it means, look at how pretty it is! And it has a heart in the middle!

So here is the way this one works. 

1. Each person must post 11 things about themselves.
2. Answer the 11 questions that the person who gave you this award has set for you.
3. Create 11 questions for the people that you will give this award to.
4. Choose 11 bloggers to award, (seeing a pattern here?) and send them a link to your post. Go to their page and tell them!
5. No tag backs.

Ok, here they are, in no particular order. 11 Fun-filled facts about the Snarky one:
1. I'm very short, 5'2" and covered with freckles
2. I love frozen mudslides
3. I climbed Diamond Head in Hawaii when I was 5 months pregnant with 15
4. I wrote the very first Keno ticket ever sold in Atlantic City!
5. I am not athletically inclined at all. I've run 2 marathons and countless half marathons, but I can't shoot a basketball, or swing a bat or hit a tennis ball to save my life.
6. I hate raisins in my food. HATE pudding with raisins, HATE raisin bread
7. I have an enormous crush on Tom Hanks
8. I never, EVER talk politics
9. I have seen Duran Duran in concert at least 18 times 
10. My favorite restaurant in the whole world is the Aberdeen Barn in Williamsburg, VA
11. If I was able, I'd go to Walt Disney World every single year

My 11 questions to answer (those that Sassy Quest as asked me to answer):

What’s your favorite movie of all time and why?  Better Off Dead, so many great lines to quote
Who is your celebrity crush? Tom Hanks
What are the first three things you would do if you won $100 million in the lottery? Pay off credit cards, pay off my car, take my girls shopping (pretty boring, huh?)
What song compels you to sing karaoke? Paradise By The Dashboard Light
What is your favorite board game? Scrabble
What superpower would you most like to have and why? Is having great hair 24/7 a superpower? Because that's what I'd want
If you made a mix tape (yes, I said mix tape) about your life what song would HAVE to be on it? Der Kommissar, the ULTIMATE 80's song.
What is your favorite scent? Cookies baking in my oven
What is one thing on your bucket list? Skydiving
Puppies or Kittens? Discuss. I love them both. Both are equally adorable but kittens are easier to litter train
How much wood could a woodchuck chuck if a woodchuck could chuck wood: About a 2x4

And finally, here are my 11 questions for MY award winners to answer:
Coffee or tea and why?
White, milk or dark chocolate? 
What is the best Paul Newman movie?
What is the best era for music? Why?
Do you own skinny jeans?
What's your ultimate job?
How many hours of sleep do you normally get per night?
Time outs or spanking?
Do you prefer to read serious or funny stuff (blogs, books, articles, etc) and why?
What is your favorite color of Crayola crayon?
What, in your opinion, is the greatest TV show of all time?


Last but certainly NOT least, here are the 11 bloggers upon which I am bestowing this lovely pink award. Go say hi to them and give them some snarky love:

Rubber Chicken Madness
Crazy Mama Drama
Razorblade Brain
Rolling Sin
There Must Be A Third Option
Suburbia Interrupted
The Fordeville Diaries
Bad Parenting Moments
Momaical
You Know It Happens At Your House Too
What I Really Meant to Say Was

What's a mother to do??

So most of you know my ongoing saga. Every morning it's the same thing. Will they or won't they? Did they get up? Are they still in bed? Have 15 & 12 made the school bus today? Or is Teri in a bad mood again? Since the beginning of middle school, when the buses come an hour and a half earlier than they used to when 15 & 12 were in elementary school, I've been fighting a losing battle. The battle of the bus. Cue the John Williams soundtrack and imagine me, in my ninja suit, standing in the middle of my subdivision fighting the evil forces of the big yellow bus?

No. Picture instead, me in my jammies standing at the foot of 15's bed nagging at her to get up. Then picture me heading into 12's room and nagging HER to get up. This would be 6:05. And then 6:10. Then I go downstairs to channel my inner Chef Bobby Flay as I whip together a gourmet PB&J for lunch. Then at 6:20 I head back upstairs again, to ONCE AGAIN try to rouse my sleeping babies.

This is a daily occurrence, a battle I'm growing ever-weary of fighting. And yet, I carry on, knowing that one day, my children will be out of my house and leading their own lives and mom won't be there to get their lazy asses out of bed. I just have to pray they will be able to make it to college classes on time without me there to nag them into awakeness. I am NOT helicopter mom. I am NOT sweet, kind, nurturing mom. By 6:35 I'm screaming bitchy mom, pissed off that my kids can't get to bed early when I nag them at night to go to bed.

They are up in their rooms by 9:45 or 10:00 at night and then I go into my own bed, hoping that everyone will soon be dreaming of happy wake ups, and when I get up to pee at midnight, which I am apt to do most nights, 15 is farting around in the bathroom and 12 is in her room going over the latest Bop pull out poster of Niall Horan (the blond Irish boy from One Direction, stay with me). REALLY??? Here is where I get mad at them. Here is where I start threatening. But the threats fall on deaf ears. Because, of course, they know better than I do that they'll get up in the morning when I want them to get up. Silly me for even THINKING they'll give me a problem in the morning. What kind of cranky bitch-ass mom am I? These are my darling children, they'd never lie, they'll go right to sleep and wake up bright eyed and bushy tailed for me in the morning and make time for breakfast and make it on the school bus on time. And then unicorns being ridden by fairies and soft, fluffy bunnies will come flying out of my ass.

And then the alarm goes off. And the frustration starts. I've tried pouring water on them to get them out of bed (ooooh how they hate that and, in turn, they hate ME for doing that. Puts 'em in a pissy mood every time!). I've tried using an air horn. The dogs are useless because they jump on the beds, try to kiss the girls awake, the girls pull covers over their heads and the dogs give up. The girls are just too tired to get up.

Now, I hear great tips, wonderful advice from my friends all the time: Let them walk to school, let them ride their bike to school, let the miss school. But here's the downside to all of those great ideas. It's just not always possible. 15's school is 11 miles away on twisty, windy country roads with no shoulders. She'd start walking to school and get hit by a tractor or a deer and I'd miss her very much. 12 actually CAN walk to school but we have no sidewalks for this walk so she's walking in traffic.  If my kids have 5 unexcused absences in one marking period, the STATE will take my ass to court. Not my kids, they're off scott free, but MY ass gets hauled to court. I must be an awful mother if I can't get my children to school on time each day.

They KNOW that mom is there to drive them, to fall back on should they miss the bus (should they? 15's missed the damn bus more than she's made it and we're not even out of effing September yet!) They know I'm their backup. And yes, I'm guilty of being their backup. But what else am I going to do? Get taken to court for not taking them to school?

So I open the floor for suggestions. Please don't offer silly suggestion, like 'oh you should run away!' because I've already tried that. They found me and dragged me back. And please don't say 'Don't drive them, let them walk', because, well, see that paragraph above the booze. I'm looking for new, refreshing ideas. I've charged them money, and now they're broke. I've taken away phone, television priviledges, computer time, HOMECOMING, grounded them. If anyone suggests REWARDING them for making the bus, please send me money to pay them.

Seriously, people, what would you do? Anyone have any fresh, scathingly brilliant ideas that haven't been brought up before? Anyone?

Snarkfest: The Movie!

So check out the little video that my friend and fellow sister in snark, Teresa, made for me for my attempt at being one of the finalists in the Blogger Idol competition!! ALL the cool kids are into Snarkfest. It is witty, entertaining and totally snarky!! Love this.

Thanks T!!

A Beautiful Mudder!

The lovely and talented Jules over at My Mom's A Whackjob has bestowed upon me the Laine Blogger Award for Beauty. Here are the rules for this award:

1. Answer the 5 questions below (same ones that I've answered)

2. Pass the award on to 5 other beautiful bloggers

1. What is your current beauty obsession?

LOL I'm fairly (read: TOTALLY) low maintenance. I rarely leave the house WITH makeup on. 
Shit I'm lucky I leave the house with my shoes on. So I can't truly call anything an obsession.
I will say that when I do my makeup, I'm digging Mary Kay's Beach Blond Cream Eye Shadow.  It goes on smooth and compliments any other shade of eye shadow that I wear (which, again, doesn't happen very often). I'd say that Beauti Control's Brown Sugar body lotion is another 'obsession'. Makes me smell like cake. I love cake.

2. What is the one beauty item you wish you owned?

Nicer hair so that when I DO actually spend time on it, it looks decent. And when I don't spend
any time on it, it doesn't look like ass. OR, I wish I actually had my own hair stylist, one who 
could come out of thin air when I get out of the shower, do my hair, then go back to wherever
they came from, and then come back the next morning, etc. Because I've had this hair for 45 years and for 45 of those years, I have had absolutely NO idea how to make it look nice. 

3. What is your favorite topic to read about?

I love scary stuff, dark stuff, mysterious stuff and funny stuff. Give me a good (OLD) Stephen King book, early Patricia Cornwell, Gillian Flynn (Just finished reading Gone Girl and LOVED it) and some Janet Evanovich, any and all Janet Evanovich, and I'm the happiest of campers. I've also found some amazing blogs out there, written by women going through exactly the same issues that I am. I had NO idea there were so many of us in this crazy sisterhood of bloggers. It's just really nice to know I'm not alone.

4. What inspired you to become a blogger?

My close friends have always told me how funny I am. I'm a fat girl, fat girls have to try harder, so I suppose with the fat comes the funny. Either way, I do love to see people laugh, so if I can make my close friends laugh, I'm sure there are others that I could make laugh without actually standing up in front of a crowd and having people throw rotten fruit at me if I'm NOT making them laugh. Plus I've got plenty of material to pull from because of my crazy amazing family. My girls' school bus adventures make for great FB fodder every morning. I'm toying with the idea of  putting their daily 'Did they make it? Did they miss it?' on the blog and see if anyone I DON'T know really cares. If you DO care, see my FB page. I put a song up every day based on whether or not they make the bus. I'm fairly certain that somewhere in Vegas, in some rinky dink little off the strip casino, there are oddsmakers shaking down gamblers over whether or not 15 and 12 make their bus each day. 

5. What nail polish are you wearing now?

Since I just ran a Tough Mudder last weekend, I cut all my nails and took off all my nail polish. Can't be pretty when you're running a 10 mile run through mud with deathly obstacles. So I don't always wear nail polish, but when I do, my current fave is Opi's Plugged In Plum.

And now it's my pleasure to pass this along to five beautiful bloggers. Please visit them when you have time:

The Nitty Gritty Mommy

Frugalista Blog

Non-Girlfriend

Mom-Spirational

Riding the Crazy Train: Diary of a Delirous Mom

I Am a Tough Mudder

Fear me.

This past Saturday, I traveled across the border to Frederick, Maryland with some of my Tough Mudder teammates to participate in what can only be explained as hell on a farm. For those of you who aren't insane, let me explain. Tough Mudder is a 10-12 mile race with obstacles that only Satan himself could think up. Our  run was 10 miles with 20 obstacles all along the route. Our first obstacle was actually getting TO the starting line. Traffic was horrific. What would normally take 45 minutes actually took us almost 3.5 hours. Lucky for us we all are a good-natured group of freaks and happily passed the time joking, laughing, taking pictures of Captain America as we waited in traffic (he was in the car with Wonder Woman and the Flash but they got back inside the car, they feared the paparazzi). Once we finally arrived, a full 2 hours later than our scheduled start time, we all made our way to the portapotties. Second obstacle of the day for me: drip dry. No TP in the potty. Life is rough. I was unaware of just how rough it would get.

Our team, Team Fossil, has been training with another team, the Mud Dogs, for this event since the spring.

We were ready. We came prepared. My fake husband Joseph is a veteran of the Tough Mudder, having done this one time before, so he knew exactly what we'd need. Long sleeve shirt. That was the first thing he suggested. Note in the picture above how many of us listened to him. Jason, the Fossil on the far left, is the only other one of us who chose to listen to Joseph (behind me, his hand on my shoulder) and wore long sleeves. The rest of us ended up with bloody, bruised elbows.

Team Fossil, before all hell broke loose

 Joseph also brought us trashbags, small plastic bags for our dirty clothes, he thought of everything. Well, except elbow and knee pads. Those would've helped. Anyway, I digress. Let's get to the starting line. Since traffic was so bad, crowds of people all started their race later than expected. Groups were supposed to go every 20 minutes in waves, since there were all those obstacles, thus avoiding 20,000 all trying to get into the dumpster full of ice cubes at the same time. So we went in the 12:40 wave. Count down after we all sang the National Anthem, and we're off!

We ran to the Arctic Enema. Yes, you read that right. Picture a gigantic construction dumpster, filled with freezing cold ice water, and ice cubes, to prevent the ice water from getting tepid. God forbid every man's testicles should stay outside their bodies. When I got out of there, my vajay-jay was tingly and not in the good way.

Among the other obstacles, there was the Dirty Ballerina, which was my first of many faceplants of the day. Imagine trying to leap across a 4 foot gap, getting a running start on 3 feet of sloppy mud. After my second try, a banged up knee, a banged up jaw and 7 lbs of mud in my mouth I knew this was going to be sooo much fun. I hoped the next obstacle was going through labor again!

Because this is a team event, and because I had a phenomenal team doing this with me, we got each other through this fresh hell together. Okay, they mostly got ME through it, but I did say 'good job' and 'thanks for saving my life' a whole bunch of times.

Other obstacles such as the Boa Constrictor, Electric Eel, Funky Monkey, Berlin Wall and Kiss of Mud all made for some dirty, hard, wet and dirty fun. If your idea of fun is crawling through tiny tubes, climbing over 15 foot walls, sliding on your belly under electric wires and barbed wire. Good, unclean fun. And another obstacle that we didn't count on was the thunderstorm, which caused them to close the water obstacles until the lightning passed. This thunder storm wasn't bad to run through, but it made running through the mud next to impossible. The mud was quickly becoming close to the consistency of chocolate custard, only dirtier. It was slippery, to the point of being dangerous, so when you knew it was too dangerous to run, you walked. And you walked like a drunken sailor. Wheeeeeeeee! The fun's just getting started!!

Towards the end of the run, when I weighed an extra 20 lbs due to all the mud in my pants, my bra, my hair and especially in my shoes, we came upon this obstacle: Twinkle Toes. We had to walk across a 4" wide beam, a shaky beam, with wet, muddy, slippery feet. If you fall, you go into the water. Guess what. I found my inner zen and made it all the way across! You have NO idea what an amazing feeling it was for me to take on that obstacle and get across without, once again, falling into the drink. Yay me!! Until I went to the Funky Monkey and just said screw it and jumped into the water with my teammate Keith. We both just looked at one another and jumped in. We did make it look good by at least grabbing one of the wet, slippery, muddy rungs of the monkey bars before leaping into the drink.

Team Fossil, after the apocalypse. 

This is my team. These are the people I ran through hell with, and that got me through. Was the Tough Mudder a smart idea? Judging from the bruises on my arms and legs, maybe not. Was it for a good cause? Yes, the proceeds went to the Wounded Warrior Project. Their motto: No man left behind. That was the motto of all the teams who ran. You helped whoever was near you to get through each obstacle. You held hands with strangers and pushed them up and over a wall, or helped them get down from a great height. Or you helped them out of a pool of mud or out of a tube or a dumpster full of ice water. It was team work. And it was awesome. And I'll be back next year with my team. And it'll be a blast.

Thanks Team Fossil, for rocking so hard. And thanks, Mud Dogs for letting the Fossils share from your bowl.

Please Promote Snarkfest to FB and Twitter!

Shamelessly asking for any and all of my friends and followers to please go to https://www.facebook.com/bloggeridol and write on their wall that Snarkfest needs, no, craves that 1st Runner Up prize of a Ghirardelli chocolate basket. Please go show Snarkfest some love by posting on their wall that I deserve to be in the top 13.

If you Tweet, you can also go to Twitter and Tweet @BloggerIdol and tell them that Snarkfest would be more than happy to take that Ghirardelli basket off their hands. I'm not asking to go all the way, just first runner up. 

If you folks enjoy reading Snarkfest, and I win first runner up, I would be HAPPY to share my basket with you!

I could be the next Blogger Idol!

I'm not much on reality shows, especially competitions like Big Brother, So You Think You Can Dance, Thinking about Dancing with an Idol, Dancing with a Brother, or American Idol. Give me a good Dirty Jobs with Mike Rowe or Deadliest Catch and I'm the happiest of campers. So why, then, am I actually participating in a competition like Blogger Idol? Well, I'll tell you. It's not televised, no one is judging me, no one is calling me Dawg, Ryan Seacrest is NOWHERE to be found, and it's free publicity for my blog. And you know my mantra, if it's free, it's for me. So go checkout the voting at Blogger Idol and who knows? Maybe I'll get a few more readers out of the deal. Maybe I'll get a prize. But I blog anyway, right? I may as well try to get a little something out of my blog besides carpal tunnel syndrome. The prizes are very cool ranging from a Samsung Galaxy Tab to Boogie Wipes.

Don't spill my secret but I'm actually hoping for first runner up. Come on, you know me, I'm addicted to chocolate and the prize for first runner up is a Ghirardelli Chocolate gift basket. You should be applauding me for not having an over-inflated ego. Do I think I'm an awesome enough blogger to win the Tablet? Nah. But I just might be mediocre enough to win the Chocolate. And that's good enough for me.

So, auditions are open now and will close on September 17th. The top 12 finalists will be chosen on September 20th. If I'm in the top 12 (remember, it's ALL about the chocolate and I DO share) I will be tasked with an assignment, and all assignments will be voted upon starting on September 26. Please stay tuned for more details, and don't forget to visit my Facebook page and my Twitter page.

When the voting begins, there's chocolate for everyone. Because that's how I roll. Now spread the word please.

Oh baby I'm so tired.

That was a very funny line from an Oprah show about 800 years ago. I can't find the video, I'm sure it's out there, but I'm too tired to go looking. I did try, really I did. But I gave up after about 3 clicks. I had a headache last night after work, and then went to back to school night with 12. Fun seeing all the moms of her friends but still had the headache when I got home. I farted around on FB, watched Hardcore Pawn with the family and then wrestled 15 off the computer and made everyone go to bed. I read for a bit (Gone Girl by Gillian Flynn, AWESOME book but had to force myself to put it down), set my alarm for 6:55 and off to sleep I went.

This morning, when that alarm went off at 6:55 I stared at it in complete disbelief. 15's bus comes at 7:00. 12's bus comes at 7:04. Anyone care to tell me WTF I was thinking setting my alarm for 6:55?? I was tired yesterday after 15 caught her bus and I had to drive 12 to school, so I came home and went back to sleep (hence me resetting the alarm). Yep, I'm tired. I'm not sure why I'm so damned tired. I do know that I have an appointment on Friday with my doctor to discuss my elevated thyroid levels, so maybe that's part of it. Maybe it's running (which is supposed to energize me, not make me a zombie), maybe it's cleaning the house for inlaws over last weekend, maybe it's all the kids' activities, while working full time. Maybe it's trying to keep everyone happy and stretching myself too thin. But whatever the hell it is, I'm sitting here at my desk with heavy lidded eyes just counting the hours until I can go back to bed.

Not going to happen too early tonight. I've got back to school night with 15 tonight, then Spirit Night at Chick Fil-A to raise money for 15's High School Marching Band. Probably not going to happen tomorrow night. Our Team Fossil meeting is tomorrow night, followed by the last workout before the Tough Mudder on Saturday. Definitely not going to happen on Friday night. First home football game of the season for 15, so she'll be playing in the marching band and I'll be working in the concession stand. Saturday is the Tough Mudder where I will run 10 miles and leap hay bales, crawl into muddy tunnels, attempt to carry my body weight while doing monkey bars, climbing, crawling, getting electrocuted, swimming, carrying a log up a hill, good times, people, good times!

I swear to God, I am sleeping all day Sunday. As God as my witness, I'm sleeping ALL. DAMN. DAY. So that I can start all over again next Monday. Except that's when Volleyball games start for 12. Ugh, is it Christmas break yet?

Happy Birthday, 15!!

I'd like to take a moment to wish my oldest a very happy 15th birthday. For the next 6 weeks I will refer to my children as 15 and 12. It's crazy, there's NO way I can be old enough to have a 15 year old child.

As we were losing Princess Diana in a Paris tunnel 15 years ago, I was 'hee hee hee hoo hoo hoo'ing' in labor ON Labor Day with 15. I was in labor from about 4:00 a.m. on September 1, watching the coverage of Diana's death and thinking, 'wow, such a sad day, who didn't love the Princess?' And just 19 little hours later, 15 was finally delivered, via C-section. One princess lost, and another princess brought into the world.

15's been a learning experience for me. I love her with all my heart and my soul. When she was small, she wasn't the nicest little girl to her family. She was wonderful to anyone to whom she was not related. But to her mom, her dad and her sister, she was trying. Trying to dance on my nerves. Trying to be smarter than everyone. Trying to see just how far she could push my buttons. But as she began growing up a bit, I started noticing a change in her personality. She's much nicer to all of us, she's learned that she actually CAN be nice to us and we're all much happier about that. I find myself yelling a lot less, which is an all around win.

She's growing into an amazing young woman, finding out who she is, learning what she loves and what she doesn't, and I'm so blessed to be along for the ride. So to my beautiful, amazing 15, I wish you a very Happy Birthday and many many happy returns. <3

The beautiful, lovely, gorgeous, talented, friendly and amazing 15.