What the hell kind of blog is this anyway?

I have a ton of shizzle to talk about. So much, in fact, it surprised me that so much of my life is amusing enough to tell other people about it. Since I started this bloggiepoo, I make mental notes about the stuff that happens as I go through my comically monotonous daily routine so I can write about it later. Today my brain reached maximum capacity, and I need to write it all down so as to make room for more stuff to happen.

As I tried to organize my thoughts into some sort of logically-flowing monologue, I got to thinkin'. How does any of this stuff fit together? What does it all have in common? I asked myself. The answer? Nothing. None of it's really even remotely profound.

So what the hell kind of blog do I have goin' here? Is it a knitting blog? Sometimes. Is it a Mommy blog? Sometimes. But I write about other stuff too. Stuff I like, stuff I hate, people I hate, stupid things I do, even stupider things that other people do, movie reviews, and just general kvetching. And, don't forget, a World Cup Primer and an advanced tutorial on What To Do If Your Fish Starts Swimming Upside Down. I strive to inform as well as entertain. Value Added for your hard-earned dollar.

It's all here at Behold My Brilliance, folks. I like to think there's a little sumthin for everybody. It's hard to classify, and I kinda like it that way.


Knitting Part:

Alert the media. I FINISHED SOMETHING. I made the little drawstring bag on the cover of Last Minute Knitted Gifts, only I used a cotton varigated yarn cuz I liked the pastels and I was going to put baby stuff in it (soap, nail clippers, hairbrush, etc.)and take it to a baby shower. But the varigated stuff came out kinda weird. The top part had more stitches in each round than the bottom did, so the color changes came out in stripes on the bottom but not on the top. Looks kinda goofy. I'll take a picture if I remember.

What I Learned: Varigated doesn't work for everything. AND I mastered the 3-needle bind-off. Go, ME!

I also took a moment to think about how many UFO's I have laying around. I'll see if I can't gather them up for a picture too.

Other knitting news, I found a froggable vest at a church sale and spent several hours yesterday destroying it. It was knit with two strands of yarn held together, which was a complete pain, and if someone had told me how much work that would be I wouldn't have started it. Is it me or does it seem like my own work falls apart with a lot less effort? Still, I wound up with two big ol' balls of a pretty cotton/linen blend and it looks nice. I don't think that the amount of yarn originally used to make this vest in a size extra small is going to be enough to make an extra large one to fit me, but I'll think of something to make with it.

What I learned: Take BEFORE pictures. Frogging someone else's work is sadistically therapeutic.


Mommyblog Part:

After I dropped Beeb off at her camp this morning, I took the boys to the movie theater, thinking a movie would be a supercool surprise. At the end of the school year, I bought discounted tickets so that all summer long you can see already-on-DVD kids movies on the big screen. You get to go to six movies for $9. Now, we could rent all six of the movies for less than I spent on the tickets, but I thought the kids would like the experience of going to the movie theater, having popcorn and soda, sitting in the big seats, and watching a movie on a screen the size of our garage door.

I was so, so wrong.

Today's movie was Wallace and Gromit and "The Curse of the Were-Rabbit". A great movie, by the way.

Ryan kept saying, in a rather loud whisper,

"Mommy, we've already SEEN this movie! We HAVE this movie at HOME!!!!"

Tito chimed in, even less subtly, "YEAH, we HAVE this one, Mommy!!"

So I told them, "Yes, I know, but you get to go to the movie theater, have popcorn and soda, sit in the big seats, and watch a movie on a screen the size of our garage door. Isn't this fun??"

To which Ryan replied,

"But why would we want to come to a movie that we've already SEEN? That doesn't even make any SENSE, Mom!"

This is the same child who once watched Return of the Jedi three times in the same day.

"But guys, there's popcorn!"

"We wanna go home."

So we left. Effin ingrates.


Good Stuff I bought recently:

The George Foreman Grill - the biggest one
Kerasal Foot Scrub
Monistat Soothing Gel
The Skip Dr. Disc Repair Kit

I will discuss these in more detail in a later post, but go ahead and buy them now with my blessing.


Other Stuff That's Coming Up In My Life:

Father's Day. As bad as Mother's Day but with the added dimension that I have to go kiss FIL's ass for several hours.

Our Hometown Parade. Always good entertainment. Aldigirl appears yearly with her Baton Twirling Class, prancing down the street in a frilly leotard, carrying a baton in her left hand and posing her right hand in a military salute. I'll try to snap a pic.

Summer PSR. I will surely be discussing the woman I like to call the PSR Czar, and the debut of her new "assigned parking spot" system. Should be good.


And Some Happy News that you'll all be glad to hear:

Maddie got the card and emailed me a very nice thank you. I'm glad I sent it. I seriously almost plucked it out of the mailbox before it went out, but I knew I would have felt horrible if I didn't send it. I really wasn't mad at her, I don't hate her at all, I was just kinda mad at her for being mad at me, does that make any sense? I was more sad than mad, but it makes me mad when people make me sad.

Ok, that sounded like Dr. Seuss meets Dr. Phil.


So now that I've covered most of my regular topics, today, kids, I thought I'd discuss a few potential new features that you, the fans, have suggested.


Crock Pot Recipes.

I don't even have any Crock Pot recipes. I didn't even know there were recipes. The whole beauty of the Crock Pot is that you can throw a whole bunch of shit in it and wait for it to cook itself into something.


Political Discussion.

It's not that I don't have an opinion on certain subjects; I have lots of opinions. I just hate talking about politics because I don't like to argue and I know I'm not going to change anybody's mind and nobody's going to change mine. Why get into it? I have no party loyalty. I voted for George Bush in 2002, and for Al Gore in 1998.

I do feel strongly that we should do away with both term limits and straight-ticket voting. If someone's doing a good job, they should be allowed to continue. Don't like the guy? Don't vote for him.

And as for straight-ticket voting, I just dislike the idea of punching the card once to say "Yep, every member of this party is automatically the best candidate for the job. I don't need to know anything else about them, that's good enough for me." That's just stupid. Do the research. Form an opinion. Some of the people in your favored party are probably assholes. I'm not saying you shouldn't vote all one way or all another way if you wanted to, my point is that you're gonna vote, you should be expected to make the effort of reading through the entire ballot.

See? Political discussion just feels weird in here, doesn't it? I'm pretty sure that's the last you'll see of that.


Money-Saving Coupons. Look, don't I do enough for you by telling you about stuff that's worth the money and stuff that's not?


Maps to the Stars' Homes. I actually do know where Bob Costas lives. And I can show you were Nelly went to high school. That's about the best I can do.


More Parenting Advice.

Most days, I feel like my life is a big fat example of what NOT to do, but occasionally I get something right or at least it's funny enough that I can overlook whatever parenting errors I may have made. For example, yesterday Tito came in to the 'puter room with the little potty seat (a small, padded seat with handles that sits on top of the potty so he doesn't fall in) around his neck. I had no idea how or why he put his head through the hole, but he did. He walked in with a (forgive me) shit-eating grin and he looked so hilarious I was turning to reach for my camera when suddenly he started screaming.

He was trying to pull it off of his head, and it was stuck.

Moment of conflict. Do I help the poor child pull the toilet seat off his head or do I snap a quick picture first?

I figured if I didn't get the thing off his head, CPS would take plenty of pictures when I took him to the Emergency Room with a toilet seat around his neck. I didn't think I'd be able to get him in the car with it on, either. I visualized him sitting between his brother and sister in the back of our Mazda and the three of them wailing the whole way to the hospital. Beeb would be upset that Tito's toilet seat is touching her hair and God Forbid if we should see anyone we knew in the waiting room because having a little brother with a toilet seat on his head is socially devastating to an eight-year-old girl. Pie'd be more concerned that the toilet seat was encroaching into his space. Did I really want to deal with any of that?

Looking back, in the amount of time I spent debating this ridiculous quandary in my head, I could have taken a picture. But I didn't. Instead, I buttered his forehead and slid the thing off, fully expecting to look up and see Jerry Springer presenting me with the Award for White Trash Custodial DNA Test-Verified Parent of the Year.

My advice, stop worrying about them growing up with various issues caused by your own parenting ineptitude. It's a given that my kids will be in therapy, I've decided not to beat myself up about it, and rather make it my goal to show them that nobody has a perfect life. I just want to be sure that they're comfortable discussing their issues. I think I'm off to a pretty good start. And just think, they'll have plenty to talk to their respective therapists about.


More stories about Kitty Litter.

We have kitty litter in our car. Not in a container, mind you, poured out on the floor. Why? We don't have a cat. No, we have some sort of mysterious leak that has plagued us for the last year or so. I'll get in the car and the area under the passenger seat is always wet, for no reason. Nothing's spilled, it's just wet. And not just a little wet. Once I set a full roll of paper towels under the seat and pulled it out a few hours later, completely saturated and dripping. My completely uneducated guess is that somehow it's seeping in from under the car. I have no idea what's causing this, but in the blazing heat of a St. Louis summer, the car smells like Satan's buttcrack.

So R and I had this genius idea to pour some kitty litter down under the seat, the logic being that it would help with the smell and the wetness. And it did, for a while.

I kinda wish I'd run that idea by those of you who have cats first.

I didn't really realize that wet kitty litter turns to MUD. And not just mud, but icky, grainy mud that doesn't wipe off. Most inconvenient.


We haven't heard much about your insomnia recently. Are you sleeping better?

It's 3:43 AM now. No, I'm not sleeping better. Thanks for asking.

So what the hell kind of blog is this? IT'S A KICKASS BLOG, BEEYOTCH!