The mid life crisis continues

   Hangovers are God's way of saying you were a colossal idiot last night. What's ironic is that the older you get, the harder it is to recover. I feel it should be the other way around. Aren't you supposed to need the stiff kick in the pants when you're  younger? Fortunately, or unfortunately, I don't have a wealth of experience to draw on in this area. I mean with respect to drinking, the colossal idiot part, I've got down to a science.
   Recently, we went over to a friend's house because let's face it, it's always better to make an ass of yourself in front of other people rather than just the privacy of your own home.  Thank God for understanding friends. It also helps that according to accurumor, I can be funny as hell when I'm plastered. Luckily, nothing was broken, another bonus.
   The whole thing began innocently enough with a warped card game and six alleged grownups. We had some good pizza and adult beverages. I was actually fine for most of the evening until I made the mistake of attempting to have a drink with dessert. My spouse was the first one to figure out there was something wrong when I went to the bathroom. You could have written a novel in the time I took. It got even better when I had to ask for Lysol wipes and a bottle of cold water.
   One should drink responsibly. I got that part half right. I had the designated driver but I mixed. Henceforth referred to as "the Big Mistake".
   I got lucky in the sense that at least I didn't have to drive. The next day was about as much fun as a fork in the eye. My body let me know in no uncertain terms that I am way not as young as my brain thinks I am. The entire next day I was useless and eternally grateful we had no plans. The next day was Monday, and I didn't feel much better. It's a lucky thing my spouse was unemployed. I had to let him handle the majority of getting our girl to school that morning. Food was also not an option that day, either. If Gatorade is considered a meal, you're pretty sick.
    Is there some part of me that's trying to relive college days I never had? God knows age hasn't brought enough wisdom for my taste. If one were to ask why I drink in the first place, the answer is I'm the mom of a girl knee deep in puberty. Yeah, I'll probably be hung over again.

The Facebook blues

  We are knee deep in the back to school season as of this writing. It was a quieter Labor Day weekend than I would have liked. There was some excitement, if you could call it that. Our vacuum cleaners croaked before our bar b q and then our grill went on strike in the middle of cooking. The food we put in the oven peed all over the bottom and created quite a fog in my kitchen. Through the miracle of ventilation, we managed to not host the local fire department.
   I am a bit sad to see the end of the summer, despite stressing out about it. It occurs to me that it comes down again, for me to letting go. The biggest thing I worried about was keeping our daughter occupied. It was easier though, having my husband home. This is where the usual mommy guilt and my love hate relationship with social media comes in. I frequently look back on our Summer and ask myself 'How good was it?' for our girl.
   I admit I have a lot of bad habits and too much Facebook is one of them. When you look and see neighbor pictures that scream 'Look at all the fun we're having!', it's a bit hard not to feel jealous/depressed. I don't post pics of our girl for privacy reasons so having nothing to report is my choice. What I lose sight of is the fact that we have, in fact, done things. We spent our usual week at the beach, and as much as our girl complained about summer camp, there were some good field trips. There was also a family outing to a gamer con, which she enjoyed. We even managed to arrange a trip to Hershey Park with my nephew.
    Why do I even bother doing this crap to myself? Our kid is far from deprived and no one died and declared me the entertainment committee. I am, however, a game nerd, and the self appointed electronics gestapo. Therein lies my problem. I struggle with letting our girl entertain herself in ways that don't involve a screen. The complaints of 'Do I have to?' are endless. Perhaps earplugs would help. It's not like I've never heard the whining before. How do you toughen the armor and more importantly stay out of the drama vortex? It looks like I'm going to need all the help I can get.
 

Mommy lets go?

   This is apparently as tough a topic to write about as it is to actually do. Our little girl, who, as of this writing, is almost ten and way not little, is going away without us for the first time. My brain understands this is no big deal and if anything, cause to break out the wine! She has stayed overnight at mom mom's house before and the upcoming event in question is only an overnight trip, too. These trips are rare, though, so rare in fact, that it feels wierd falling asleep in a house without her home.
   I remember when she was an infant and my sister was still alive. My big sis had come by to spend time with her new niece and give us a break. I remember backing out of our driveway and looking back, not seeing a car seat, and wondering what was wrong. 'Is everyone wearing pants?' 'Holy crap, There's no car seat back there!' Fast forward, or blink, in my case, and our fifth grader is spending the night in another state with her older cousin and his girlfriend. It's not them I'm worried about. Once the initial, 'Praise God, we're free!' joy wears off, will I be able to relax? This is me, after all.
    Most things I worry about turn out just fine. I even have evidence written in my own hand, no less, in an old journal. Don't ask me why I have yet to stop worrying over things. I have yet to come up with an antidote for that. I'm not sure I'd recognize myself if I did manage to get a grip. Guilt would be another piece of baggage I'd like to lose. How dare you enjoy yourself as a parent without your offspring??!! It takes the assistance of that rare creature, the good babysitter. We've had rare sightings over the years but we have seen them. It's a short list of people we feel comfortable leaving our daughter with, and not just because our family is small.
   Epilogue: Not only did our girl have a blast with her cousin, but mommy and daddy had a wonderful beach day. I got to eat dinner without thinking about hot dogs or chicken fingers. Nobody got sunburned, and since the kids went to Hershey Park, they even brought back chocolate! This was almost like having another birthday!
It's too bad my nephew and his other half are both in grad school and living in Delaware. We won't be able to do this sort of thing often. The problem is that we need to do this more often. Sending her majesty away like that is too expensive to do regularly, of course, but I'd settle for a few hours to ourselves. We are accepting applications, any takers?
 

Neutral territory?

  I normally try to avoid anything political when I write. I'm currently running a bit low on ideas though. I'm not sure who originally said it so I'll credit my favorite, Robin Williams, who said politicians are like diapers and should be changed for the same reason. (Something to that effect - sorry Robin.) One of my love hate relationships is with Facebook. There's no other place I found that can make me laugh and feel completely inadequate so well. It is also lousy with politics.
    If you want to see venom, there's no shortage of it on line, and Oh, by the way, you're the problem.  The biggest thing I've noticed in that meme eat meme world is people attaching a lot of additional information about a person from the expression of one opinion. Now before you go assuming I think there is such a thing as a "nice white supremacist", let me explain. I am referring to people who have ended friendships simply because of politics. While one could argue that passion is not a bad thing, this country was founded so people could express differing opinions. Life is also much too short to cut out good people from your life for only one thing that you don't agree with.
   Without going into gory detail, I will tell you that I voted for neither Trump nor Hillary.  I will also say that while I have yet to be a fan of any president we've elected since I became mature enough to care, I particularly dislike the Orange One. There are pantloads of reasons but I can't  support any guy who has such a piss poor attitude toward women, especially as the mother of a daughter. I will leave it there.
   Now, I also have dear friends who actually voted for him and still would do so again. Regardless of how baffling I find this, these people are still very welcome in my home. This may be surprising to some but the reason they are still friends is that we simply agree to disagree. They have also have enough life experience and education to formulate reasonable arguments. Most likely, it's because we are older and prefer to focus what passion we can scrape up on other things, like our kids' choices and how in God's name do you leave your house and walk right past the wine you were going to bring?

The great outdoors?

  We are having quite a soggy summer so far. So far, our basement has survived. I expected much worse, to be honest. In previous years we've made good use of our shop vacs, and we weren't picking up legos. It's also a bit strange that so far this summer, my garden hasn't been producing much. I know I was late to the party in planting to begin with but as of this writing, it's late July and normally we would have stopped buying tomatoes. There's probably a shortage of bees, unless they're on vacation.
   We finally got some mulch down out front and a bunch of weeding done. We even trimmed our bushes out front within an inch of their lives and then another two inches. Any project in which nothing was killed works for me.  What's ironic about all this exterior maintenance crap is that we really don't use our exterior much.  You won't see our family on a Home Depot commercial any time soon.  We are a somewhat different demographic. I could see our ad . Home Depot, when you just need to keep the neighbors from calling the township!
   The problem with weeding is it's like fighting a wall of pudding. Those cloth "barriers" people sell only help slightly. New Jersey weeds are apparently made of tougher stuff.  I have a crap grass issue. The junk I'm trying to get rid of seems to be some sort of demonic cross between a magician's scarf and a fishnet. I can pull up one clump of this garbage and magically four other attached clumps appear.
   Another problem for me personally is all that goddamn nature outside. Those that know me are aware of what a bug wus I am. Since becoming a mom, I've  gotten better over the years. I don't even mind bees, provided they're the right kind. When it comes to bees, I am unabashedly racist. I don't mind the normal 'hey-I'm-pollinating-over-here' type. We understand each other. I leave them alone and they do likewise. What I hate are the 'Buicks-with-wings' that love my deck and hover two inches from my face. Whatever eats those, I want one for a pet.
   My area also seems to be lousy with bunnies. I also put a wall of wire around my tomato plants but so far the only thing it's been keeping out is me! My garden gnome is fired. When I say "gnome" I mean small statue of a T-rex eating gnomes. I think I should have gone with the prone gnome holding an AK 47 or at least Elmer Fudd. Are my bunnies from North Jersey? "Yeah, I got your gnome right here, lady!" I will be glad when fall arrives but I will miss Jersey tomatoes, assuming we get any!
 

Being a grown up

   Dear Diary, it appears I have let myself down. I took a job through a friend to help out at a small accounting office for tax season. I rejoined the dark side, just when I was hoping to get away. Even seasoned, published writers have told me not to quit my day job, not that I've had one lately. The problem is that neither has my spouse -had a job - that is. It's wearing on us, as a family because we are using too much of our savings. I'm not making enough money to live on, far from it, but I was hoping this would have helped out with groceries and gas.
  The position I took was an administrative assistant type of position answering phones, scheduling appointments, and scanning documents. I received 2 nasty emails from my boss within the first 5 part time days of me being there. How do you continue to work for someone who clearly doesn't want you there? It would appear that I'm not friendly enough on the phone, yet somehow too chatty off the phone. The only thing that seems to help is to acknowledge that the owner doesn't know what she wants from one day to the next and that anything I say can and will be misconstrued and used against me.
   Funny how I was told I need to be more professional by someone who has no problems sending rude emails to subordinates and handles questions from new hires like it's a royal pain! The question is whether or not I should stick with a job that is not worth the aggravation and stress to help someone who is not a good person. Would quitting send the wrong message to my daughter? Is it worth the time and gas when you don't want to stress over what may have imploded on you while you were gone?
     Well, it turns out the decision was made for me when my phone rang and her majesty decided that she did not want my services any more. That afternoon I met a friend for lunch and we toasted to the end of "shit jobs". I emailed my hours and have not heard back. We are assuming that if I get a check at all, it won't be correct.
   I mentioned that I was worried about the message I would send to my daughter if I quit this job (now hypothetically). A wise friend pointed out that tolerating poor treatment from other adults is the way wrong message to send to a girl! The fact that this was a business relationship didn't matter and he was right. I explained to her that while I didn't quit just because something was hard, the person I worked for did not behave the way a boss should and I wasn't sorry I lost this job. It's easy to forget how much a kid can puck up on when you are wrapped up in your own grown up issues.
   I try to see what I can learn from disasters like this and the first thing that springs to mind is to not bring in any more personal things than you can fit in your pockets. The other lesson is that sometimes, you need to fire your boss.  I just hope I get my mouse back.

Back to school for who?

  Let me begin this by reminding everyone out there of the old joke about parenthood. It's the toughest job you'll ever love. That is as true as breathing for me. It's all about the offspring. She has managed to permeate everything from our diet to vacations to my writing. This is par for the course and I am more than content with our lifestyle change. It has certainly challenged my creativity to say the least. I have had to find all sorts of ways to get cooperation out of a lot of stubborn on two legs. It adds to the fun  when you know damn well whose DNA you're dealing with and you did this to yourself on purpose.
    There is also an old commercial for office supplies that says "It's the most wonderful time of the year." They are referring to the "Back to school season" as retailers call it. What's also been very true for me is that my daughter is in school, but we're the ones getting educated.  This has been true on a lot of levels. The "season" with all of its sales reminds me a lot of how sugary breakfast cereals are marketed. Why does everything have to be new every fall? "Merchandising, where the real money is made!"  (Mel Brooks, I think, wrote that.) There's your answer.
   I'm late to the party on this, which is typical for me. Our daughter is now in 5th grade. When she was in preschool everything had to have Elmo on it. We are now almost out of Pokemon hell. This last phase had some staying power. My grown up brain however, keeps looking at a perfectly good backpack from last year and I can't grasp the necessity of spending money for a new one when this one still functions. Therein lies my problem. "Function" was never the issue. The "Logo" is no longer correct. The solution would be to stop buying crap with anything on it in the first place. Slowly, the coffee kicks in.
   I recall having gone through this when I would contemplate throwing a birthday party for her majesty. I realized that if I only bought a few things with this week's hot item plastered on them and just stuck to matching colors for the rest I was much better off. I was no longer stuck using leftover Lightning McQueen plates for grown up birthdays, not that my husband ever cared. It appears this concept has much broader applications than I thought. I am much happier saving money where I can at the beginning of the school year. It leaves more room in the budget for liquor store gift cards for her teachers by June. They're gonna need it.