Music, food and....hey did you just beat up Mike Rowe??

Happy (wet and cold) Wednesday, Snarklings! I was able to wrestle Jenn off the computer long enough to figure out a way to edit yet another video clip. I'm almost getting good at this.

Remember yesterday when I brought up Sir Mix-a-Lot in the video clip? Well apparently Mike's very attractive, very talented camera man, Antwan Flowers is also a bit of a wiseass. Not very savvy with the old phones because he couldn't get mine to work to take a simple picture. Then he had the audacity to tell me that THAT'S why I brought up Sir Mix-a-Lot in the first video, because mine was the phone he used in the Baby Got Back video. Ha. Ha. Stick to your work behind the camera, funny man. ;)

Kidding, we LOVED Antwan. He's going to be Jenn's new mentor as she branches out into the field of TV production. Or garbage collector. Could go either way right now.

Anyway, without further ado, here is the second installment of my up close and personal interview with Mike. Stay tuned for more, Snarklings!

And since we discussed Billy Joel's 2 songs, here they are. First, here's Elegy: The Great Peconic

Video courtesy of the YouTube

And here is Billy Joel's 'Souvenir' which I LOVE that Mike mentions because it's a song that makes me weep, and weak in the knees when I hear it.

Video courtesy of the YouTube

Stay tuned, Snarklings!! There's plenty more to come. Sneak peek? Ok.......Dancing With the Stars, and how Mike's not allowed back in Disneyland.

And if you missed the first installment, you can see it here!

The Days of Wine and...Feet

Hey Snarklings! Looks like I found a tiny part of my brain that works on techie stuff! Who knew? I've been able to edit the first 5 minute segment of the Mike Rowe interview and am happy to post it for you here! Pay attention to Mike's reaction to my foot. I'm thinking it's the stuff that nightmares are made of.

I want to thank 16 for her outstanding work as my camera crew. She rocks.

And I want to thank Mike for not running out of the room screaming and calling security on me. 

Stay tuned, there's plenty more where that came from. And please pardon my lack of interviewing skills. I don't really think I did all that bad for my very first time. I was afraid I was gonna go all Cindy Brady when the cameras came on.

Just another Sunday afternoon in DC...

So this happened Sunday.

My second husband and I. Eventually. (totally kidding)

And this.

Jenn and her new step-daddy. (totally kidding)

To say that I am still on Cloud 9 would be an understatement. To say that this guy is awesome just doesn't do him justice. From the first welcoming hug to his final goodbye as he walked us out, my experience with Mike Rowe was truly the best experience I've ever had with a celebrity. Okay a quasi-celebrity, but whatever. He was fantastic. (Mike, if you're reading this, don't let it go to your head, you big Diva).

For everyone else, here's how it went. I sent an email to mikeroweWORKS HQ Saturday around noon saying that if Mike had any free time at all on Sunday (he was in town for the USA Science and Engineering Festival in DC), that I would be happy to make the trek down to the city to sit down for a chat, if it was possible. 2 hours later I received a call back saying that if I could make it to DC around 1:30 Sunday, Mike would be happy to meet with me. Yeah I think I could fit that into my schedule. (Keep in mind that this has been an on-going thing, us trying to set up a meeting, I didn't just ask and receive, it was a process)

Sunday morning, Jenn and I piled into the car and drove to the metro station, took the metro into town and arrived early. If you've never been to the Walter E. Washington Convention Center, it's massive, it takes up over 3 city blocks and is about 5 stories high. So once we found the room where we were supposed to meet Mike, we didn't stray very far from it. (I was so afraid of getting lost in the vast expanse of the building!) We met Susanna from mrW who let us into the green room (the conference room set aside for Mike and his crew). She told us they were running behind but would be there shortly, help ourselves to any food/drink we wanted and off she went to catch a flight back to the west coast. We saw Matt Freund (from the Poo Pot episode Dirty Jobs). We snacked and we waited.

Suddenly, the doors opened, and his entourage walked in with him and then, in that deep, sexy voice, I heard: "Well, well, well." I melted right there on the chair. When they scraped me up, he put out his hand to shake mine but I clumsily asked for a hug instead. You'll get your handshake but let's get the formalities out of the way early. After the hug, I shook his hand. Whatever. Don't judge me. I'm lucky I didn't try for some tongue. My kid would be in therapy for (more) years.

There was chit chat, he introduced us to Mary who is the president of mikeroweWORKS, and to Antwan (I hope I'm spelling that right) who was his camera man. I introduced them to Jenn, who I said was my producer, director, camera girl, sound girl and entourage. I gave them some Snarkfest bookmarks which they found amusing (who wouldn't find a picture of a cat's ass sticking out of a drawer amusing??)

I digress (as usual). So while I was standing there with my crew of 1 talking with Mary, Mike went out into the hall behind the conference room (green room) to scout out a place for our chat. He called Jenn, Antwan and I out and he had set up two chairs for us to sit and two chairs for our camera people to sit. The man does his own grunt work. Just sayin'.

We sat down and for the next 45 minutes he answered my totally off the wall questions with a smile. He told me that he had just spent time with a journalist from CNN and did a live spot with CBS so this little off the cuff interview with non-standard questions was just what he needed. My thinking was this: YES he has a new show coming out and YES he has his mikeroweWORKS foundation, but I would imagine that answering the same questions over and over would really start to get boring. I did NOT want to bore this guy. So I asked him questions like: What would your stripper name be, and tell me your signature move. Trust me, we all had a good laugh at that. Also among the questions, what's on his mp3 player, would he consider voicing a cartoon character and would he do Dancing With the Stars if he was asked.

I have the whole thing on my video camera, and I promise you, if you are patient with me while I try to figure out how to get it all to work, you will NOT be disappointed when I post the interview. But what I'm planning on (trying to do) is to break the interview up into 5 minute segments, because I have a feeling I would lose people if I posted one entire 45 minute video.

Check back in soon and if you don't want to miss a thing, go up there on the right side under my picture and subscribe to this blog so that you receive an email with a link back here every time I post. Trust me, I won't spam you (I'm not that smart, don't give me too much credit) and you DON'T want to miss his signature stripper move. It's hot.

Holy Crap!!! I'm meeting Mike Rowe!!!!

Snarklings, the time has come! It's really happening!! I got a call from the lovely Tara from the mikeroweWORKS home office in the Golden State, asking if I was free to meet with Mike Sunday in his 'green room' (who knew he had a green room??? I wonder if he has a director's couch?). I told her I'd have to think about it for a little while (like hell I did). I told her YES!!! I'd be happy to!! So I'm traveling to DC tomorrow to meet up with him. Pins. And. Needles. Just sayin'. I wonder if he's as excited to meet me?

Photo courtesy: Discovery networks

Stay tuned for details. I'm taking 16 with me as my designated photographer. It'll be interesting to see if she can do more than just 'selfies'.

New series: I've Kissed A Lot of Frogs...

Starting today I'm going to begin a new series that I will write weekly regularly whenever I get off my ass and write it. The series is called "I've Kissed a Lot of Frogs" and it will feature various stories of all the jackasses losers jerks assbags fellas I dated before I found my one true love. Trust me. I've got a lot of stories to tell. Because seriously, I really HAVE kissed a lot of frogs.

In honor of 16's Prom this weekend I'm going to tell you the story of my senior prom date. I went with a guy that I was seeing, let's call him E. E's friends and my friends had all coupled up in the months leading up to the Prom, so we all went together. When E came to pick me up, he looked very handsome in his black tux, white shirt, black cummerbund and.... no socks. My mother was horrified. The guy was dressed to the nines with no socks.

Flash forward to the Prom. We had fun. My friend M and her boyfriend E (but a different E, not my E, so to avoid any further confusion, let's call them ME as a couple) had been together for quite awhile longer than the rest of us. M and I concocted a plan where we'd dress sexy under our gowns, and by sexy I mean thigh highs and garter belts. Hey, we were 17 and thought that's what guys liked. We didn't know we were about to be dressed like hookers. Anyway, I digress. After the prom, we all went to the hotel suite that we had all pitched in to rent.

We had some soda and chips, BECAUSE THAT'S WHAT WE DRANK BACK THEN, MY DEAR DAUGHTERS, IF YOU'RE READING THIS, and had some fun. Then E and I retreated to the bedroom.

Up until that time, I was a good girl. I still had my virginity intact. But I was prepared to give it up to E that night, despite the fact that he wore no socks to my Prom. We were pretty close to sealing the deal when I came up with this hair-brained idea that he should probably wear a condom.  I know, it's crazy, right? I really didn't think I was asking too much. I mean, what 17 year old guy doesn't have a condom in his wallet?? It was the 80's for crying out loud! Well we bickered back and forth for a few minutes. He had a condom in his glove compartment in the car. But he didn't feel like going down to the car to get it. ARE YOU KIDDING ME??? He wanted ME to go down to his car and get his condom out of his glove compartment. Yes, read that sentence again. I'll wait. No. Freaking. Way.

Needless to say, no virginity was lost that night.

I DID, however, end up giving it to him later that summer, after graduation. (Shut up, I was young and stupid) This time, his condom was in his dresser drawer, so there was no bickering that night. However, that dresser was located in a bedroom in a house he shared with his grandmother. His 128 year old grandmother WHO WALKED IN ON US AS WE WERE BUMPING UGLIES. No lie, I died of embarrassment right there on the spot. Since she was 128, I'm not really sure she knew exactly what was going on, but that didn't matter. The deed was done and we were caught red-handed. That was my last contact with E. EVER.

So my first time was about as awesome as a root canal while giving birth with no pain killers. Stick around, the stories only get uglier as we go along.

BlogU Conference 2014...

Many of you may see my daily Tweets and FB posts about the upcoming BlogU Conference I'm attending in June and you may say to yourself: "Self, what the hell is she doing? Why is she posting about this shit every stinking day?" Well, first, if I may, you need to stop talking to yourself. People will worry about you and make you check into a 'facility' to get you some help.

Secondly, and more importantly, I'm doing it because I like money. "But Snarky" you might say to yourself, "how does posting about BlogU Conference make you money??" Again with the talking to yourself? Really?

I'll tell you, Mr. Noseypants, it's because the awesome chicks who are putting this conference together are offering a refund on the cost of registration to one lucky Conference attendee. It's a Rafflecopter contest, one of those that you can go back and enter every day (provided you remember). And the more times I enter, naturally, the better my chances are of winning back my $300 clams.

I'm increasing my chances JUST but writing this blog. What do you think of that? Pretty cool, huh?

I stole this from Facebook. So sue me. I may have an extra $300 if I win.

So to all of you who say to yourself "Geez, I'm sick of seeing her post and tweet about this stupid conference!" let me just say two things. First, STOP TALKING TO YOURSELF, YOU LOOK CRAZY!! And second, if you don't want to read it, skip over it. I'm not jamming it down your throat. It's once a day. I post a bunch of other crap and nobody says boo. It's only for another month and a half. Then you'll probably get sick to death of hearing about how much fun I had at the conference and how much I bought with my $300 prize money!

Homeschooling discussion, from a very cool guest poster...

Hey Snarklings. Today I'm featuring a new friend of mine with a very cool and insightful blog called Coffee is Black. Now you all know that I do love me some 16 and 14 but there is NO way on God's green earth that I could ever have the patience to homeschool those little angels. No. Way. At. All. And we all know the debate gets hot when you've got 1980425 opinions on homeschooling and every one of them is the right one, right? Right. But here is a different perspective. One FROM a former homeschooled kid, not a parent either pro or con. And it looks like she turned out pretty okay!

I give you Fiona. Read her post here, then go and check out her blog. Seriously, there's a lot of food for thought over there! But for now, please welcome the lovely Fiona from Coffee is Black...

Homeschooler in a Public Schooling World: You are Not a Special Fairy Anymore

A homeschooler in a public school is a strange and bewildered creature. There are so many things to adjust to! Here are some lessons about surviving public school that would have helped me a lot had I known them:

1. When bells ring, it means that you have to leave whatever class you're in and go to another one. It doesn't matter if you like what is going on in class. It doesn't matter if you're talking with the teacher. You actually get in trouble for staying in class. Crazy, right?

2. I learned very quickly that YOU DO NOT ASK THE TEACHER FOR EXTRA WORK. They honestly don't know what to do with you, and you will forever be marked as strange by the teacher. Seriously, don't do it.

3. It is very, VERY uncool to appear interested in the schoolwork. I made the grave mistake of getting excited about a debate about the benefit of technology in Social Studies. I thought it would be cool to play the devil's advocate and argue that we'd be better off without technology. I was "cavewoman" to the kids in that class until I graduated.

Me at school. Uncool and interested.

4. You can't leave lunch and go somewhere else because you feel like it or you have something more important to do. You will get in trouble if you just randomly wander the hallways doing stuff. Seriously, hall passes are a thing. You have to use them.

5. If you stay up late working really hard on something, you don't get a free pass to sleep in the next morning. You don't get to stay in bed past 10 or even be a few minutes late for the very legitimate reason that you are tired because you were doing work. You have to be in homeroom at 8:10 a.m. unless you're planning to play "hooky." You just have to accept it and show up on time in the morning.

6. That I-was-staying-up-late-doing-work-for-another-teacher excuse doesn't fly for homework either. This is tough when your one-and-only teacher (Mom) becomes 8 or 9 separate teachers. They don't care about the other work if it means you're doing their homework late. You just have to do it all on time. Tough cookies.

7. If you get an assignment that you could make more interesting by changing the prompt, well, don't change the prompt. You won't get a good grade, or any other kind of reward. You have to follow the instructions that the other 30 kids in class are following.

8. You can't skip ahead on the work if you already know it. You have to stay with the class. Be patient. You'll get there.

9. Don't contradict the teacher in class. It won't get you bonus points or a congratulations. You may be a *special fairy* who knows absolutely everything and is quite confident asserting yourself. BUT in public school, you have to keep that special fairy-ness in check and don't undermine the teacher.

10. Finally, bare feet are absolutely against the rules. You have to wear shoes to class. You have to KEEP THEM ON in class. If you get called to the office for something, you have to go with your shoes on. If you are in the library or study hall, you must stay shod, no matter what you actually want to do, even if it hurts your delicate Fairy sensibilities.

Myself as a Special Fairy, Pre-Public School