My Hunger

I don’t have internet access right now, so in my down time between projects I cannot read the news or do anything else substantial. Kind of annoying if you ask me…which you didn’t, but still. As a result I have been catching up on to-do lists and emails and of course doing a lot of writing about things that are not very interesting. I could write about the new cell phone I just ordered, or the Bluetooth headset that I want – but nobody cares – not even me really. So now what? I have not had the luxury of time and lack of content in a while – this may cause me to get creative…oh, the horror!


I am sitting at someone else’s desk today so that I will have network connectivity (although as mentioned above, it is limited). On their desk are antibacterial wet ones, Lysol sanitizing wipes, desk cleaner and Lysol spray. Fear germs much? I should sneeze on everything just for fun. That or lick the phone. Eww…grossed myself out. No phone licking. Will save that for my son Cole. He licks windows. I don’t know why.


People appear to take 3 hour lunches here, and when they are here they are talking about sports and drinking and other miscellaneous bullshit. I miss working in an open office arrangement like this…I am in a closed office and have no real interaction with other people during the day. I miss the miscellaneous bullshit.


I am going to drink wine tonight. And then…I am supposed to go jogging. The wine drinking will be fun. The jogging is going to suck. Bad. Maybe I could skip it tonight and just run longer in the morning… how lazy does that make me? And how bad am I that am already planning this at 3:00pm in the afternoon? All I can say about that is I wish to GOD that it was 5:00 and I was out the door to happy hour NOW. But alas, I have 2 more hours of meetings before I can leave. Stupid work. Gets in the way of fun all the time.


Carnations are ugly.


Elaborate picture frames take focus away from the pictures in them. All picture frames should be simple.


There is a guy on the phone who stutters. Is it wrong that I want to complete all of his sentences just to move the damn conversation along? Yes…it is wrong. I am going to hell.


There are no good radio stations in Delaware. None. While listening to the radio this morning I had to keep flipping stations looking for something I could tolerate and I never really found anything. And on every freaking one of them the DJs would interrupt the song at the end – before it was really over and would start talking. Do they know that we don’t care that they are even at the station? I want to hear the music. Just the music. I don’t want to hear them sing along, or tell stupid jokes. The fact that they talk at all is a big giant pain – the less they say, the better. It cannot help their ratings.


Is it bad to keep bottled water around for a long time after it has been opened and you have had some of it? Don’t germs get in there and grow?


I am hungry.


I wish I could leave work right now, go running and then be ready for happy hour at 5. That is what I truly wish. I could manage to get out of here by 3:45, which could get me back to the hotel by 4, then I could run, shower and get to the restaurant around 5:30 – a little late, but would work. I am seriously thinking about doing that. This way I could run and drink, and still run in the morning… win/win right? But – there is the issue of “the guilt”. I would leave here, hot-tail it to the hotel and then feel like I should work instead of run, and then I have gained nothing except more work. How is that fun? Exactly! It is not.


Did I mention the hungry? Because I am really hungry. I blame the steroids. Another reason I should skip running. I am sure that I am eating more than I should and the steroids are going to make me retain water and gain weight. I keep waiting (not waiting so much as dreading really) for the “moon face” that is supposed to accompany the prednisone side effects. Cannot wait for how attractive that will be.


This past weekend I did the creatinine pee challenge. This is where you pee in a gallon container for 24 hours and then take it to the doctor’s office where they take your pee, draw some blood and send you on your way. Love the tests that seem to never yield any results…especially tests that require me to store my pee in a container in the refrigerator for a whole day. So gross. So, so gross.


Hungry.


Maybe thirsty. But mostly….hungry.


This call I am on is boring me to freaking TEARS. Must find something else to do.


American Idol is on tonight and I am going to miss it. It is my true addiction and I won’t get to see it. It is being recorded at home, but I don’t think I will get to see it and I am out of town next week so I will miss that one too. What a bummer.


OK – I am out of here. Going to move up my last meeting by ½ hour, finish up, go running and show up late to happy hour. Go me.


Went to happy hour – which turned into many long happy hours. I had a great time which was completely unexpected – work is usually not a thrill a minute. I had too much to drink but didn’t end up with a hangover, so score points there. I didn’t however run this morning as I had planned so now I once again have that to look forward to before dinner. Ugh.



Just finished eating...picked the meat off of a pizza that they served at happy hour and polished off two glasses of wine. All free. Thank you very much. Still hungry.

My Dorkitude

I am supposed to be reviewing my outlook and focusing on February financials in my free time at work, and yet I don’t seem to be able to get excited about it. I am out of town at one of our locations for a few days – in meetings about ½ the time, which should allow me to get some serious work done and yet…and yet… the motivation. Where is the motivation? Did someone steal my motivation? Because, that is just not funny!

I got into town yesterday evening and actually managed to go running. I was surprised at myself for going, and glad that I did. I had not eaten all day and was starving, but thought that if I ate first I would never run at all, so I headed out right away after unpacking. Once I got back I wasn’t hungry anymore, but forced myself to eat something so that I wouldn’t wake up STARVING to death at 2am. It didn’t help though – I have been crazy hungry all day long. I managed not to eat breakfast due to the traffic from hell (took me 27 minutes to go 5 miles), however lunch didn’t bring much self control. I had a bowl of crab soup and ½ a chicken salad sandwich. I would have eaten twice that but there was no more. I am still hungry… I am a pig. If you listen really closely you will hear me oinking from all the way over here in Delaware. OINK!

God I am a dork.

I miss the boys. It is tough being away from them. And my husband. I like having dinner together and going to bed together. I really love my home life, and travel makes me miss it so much. Cannot wait to go home on Thursday. Although, I will get home, pack and then leave Saturday for a week in Portugal…but the whole family is going so that will be better than work travel. I am looking forward to the vacation, but dreading the long plane trip with the boys… we have purchased a portable DVD player and a few DVDs that may entertain them for all of ½ minute. Now we have to figure out how to fill the remaining 28799.5 seconds Any ideas? We are going to be scouring the kitchen for novelty items based on this suggestion (sundry.com) – and will definitely be bringing a wire wisk along with measuring cups and whatever else doesn’t look like it will cause too much bodily harm. I was also thinking of going to the local dollar store and picking up miscellaneous stuff to occupy there time. We will see what I have time to do in the day and a half I am home.

My Empty Evenings

I am traveling for work and missing my family terribly. Right about now I would be watching the boys run around after dinner, perhaps getting them ready for a bath. In a little while, when they began to wind down, Cole would climb into my lap with his cup of milk and blankie and would watch TV with me. Roark would eventually stumble over and plop down – his little head resting on my leg. They would lay like this until they fell asleep. I would then carry them to bed thinking about how short the time I have with them feels. On days like this – my evenings feel empty.

My Singleton Envy

Hello, I have singleton envy.

We went to Austin last weekend to see some friends who recently had a baby. He is your average baby; he cries some, spits up some, and does all of the normal baby stuff. He sleeps some (of course it is never enough for a new parent) and life at their house seems pretty normal – albeit slow. I left there thinking how easy one baby would have been instead of the two we have. Now, don’t get me wrong – I LOVE MY BOYS. Let me say it again – I LOVE MY BOYS – and I don’t wish there was only one of them, but I was a bit jealous at how easy it seemed to have only one. And then a little light went on and I became less stupid. It occurred to me that no matter how many children you have, it is still the hardest thing you have ever done. And I gave them their props and quit with the high and mighty attitude that I was copping. And you know, it is true. No matter if you have 1, 3, or 5 children – raising them is the hardest thing you will do. It is hard to get up at night. It is hard to hear them cry and not know how to make it better. It is hard to think about someone other than yourself 24x7. It is just hard. After thinking about this I felt a little embarrassed at my secret laughter when I heard that they were having trouble getting him to sleep…because lets keep it real here – interrupted sleep sucks. If it is one baby or 2 – it sucks. And anyone that is raising any children deserve credit for the long nights and heartbreaking days that it entails.

Kudos to all of you parents out there – and please accept my apology for making fun of those of you with singletons.

My Bone-Ass-Tired Ass

Last night I drank for the first time in a while…and by drink I mean I had two whole margaritas and a glass of wine. It blew my tiny little mind. And…it was good. I have been abstaining for many reasons (weight loss, exorbitant amount of money we were spending on wine, having to get up early in the morning and function like a human, this never-ending sickness that won’t go away, training) but for some reason chucked all of those good reasons and drank myself silly. It was nice. Again – it was nice. And yet, I woke up a little foggy-headed, a little more tired than my usual bone-ass-cannot-function tired, and a little sorry that I drank at all. Is this a true sign of getting old?

My Sad Mother

I came across some of my mothers old journals when I was getting dressed the other morning. I sat down with them and started thumbing through – reading random entries. A very sad, socially uncomfortable, lonely person wrote those entries…and it made me sad. I wished I could go back and sit with her, hug her, hold her hand – tell her that we all feel that way at times and that it will get better. I wanted to tell her that I have such wonderful memories of the days we spent at the beach and shopping – the same days that she seemed the most sad on those pages. I don’t know why I didn’t notice all those years ago how she felt; what was going on with her. I wish I had noticed.

I wish I had been a better daughter.

My Weekend

We are off to Austin this weekend, 4 kids in tow, to see UT play Stanford in a glorious game of baseball. We will be staying with some great friends that just had a baby a few months ago – and I cannot wait to meet their tiny new addition. It is always fun to go on an adventure, and yet it fills me with fear because there are two toddlers and two teenagers involved. And, as a little bonus, I get to drive all 4 kids home by myself while my husband stays in Austin for business (yeah, right) until Wednesday. That will be a freaking thrill. Please…pray for me.

My Long-Lost Mother

4 years ago I wrote a letter to my dead mother. Come on now, stick with me here – it is not as sick as it sounds. Well, maybe it is but please hold your comments until you see how truly screwed up I am.

Recently a co-worker of mine lost his father, and this has drudged up many thoughts about what I went through with my mom, how I coped, how I didn’t cope. When I was looking through my archives and came across that letter to my mom, the sad memories flooded over me as if she only died yesterday. Why does that happen? How can that wound still feel so fresh? Amazing how the heart can appear healed, yet be so open to pain at the same time. Stupid emotions…who thought those up anyway?

Dear Mom,

It has been four years since writing my last letter to you, and 16 years since you left me – pregnant by the way in case you have forgotten (not that I am still bitter about that or anything). Life…hmmm, life is good. I still have a good job. I have two little boys who melt me into a puddle of goo every time I see them. And the girls are pretty much full-blown teenagers. Four kids. Who would have thought I would ever end up here? Did you?

Cassie has picked out a college (John Jay School of Criminal Justice in New York) and a career (CIA Field Agent – which scares me to the core, but lets not go there). Brittany is still struggling with the whole educational purpose of school, but is blooming in its social aspects. She drives me nuts. When I put the two together I see a lot of me in them – although apart each of them is very much themselves. It is hard to explain.

Roark and Cole are really too young to see much of their personality yet. They are just starting to understand how to express humor and anger – so we have many years before we see their true colors.

Todd is doing well. He finished his MBA and is working in a job that he likes most of the time. We both want to start our own business but have not figured out what that means. So for now we get up, go to work, come home – lather, rinse, repeat. It seems kind of silly not to have some grand plan for next week, next month, next year. I spent my childhood, teenage, and young adult years trying to figure out what I wanted to be when I grew up – and I still have not really figured it out. I am a mother and a wife, but beyond that I don’t know what I REALLY AM. WHAT I REALLY WANT TO BE – TO DO. Does that make sense? Did you ever figure out who you were / what you wanted to do with your life? Did you ever figure out your purpose?

I have all of these questions still – things I need to ask you… Without a father around I really don’t have anyone to ask those things – nobody to give me that kind of advise. So I muddle through things and wonder why I am so lame that I still need my mommy.

All this to say that I still miss you.

My Perfect Boys

Todd is participating in some work activities this week that have found him up at 4:30am and home quite late. Last night this meant that the boys and I were on our own…which typically sends me into a fetal position crying for my mommy. OK, so it is not that traumatic but the evenings when one of us is on our own are certainly more of a challenge than when we are both present and accounted for. I came home with carry-out, knowing that cooking and cleaning up with little toddlers reaching for everything, climbing onto and into everything, and wanting to be picked up would suck ass. Dinner was quick and good, which was a win-win for all involved.

After dinner I thought we would go outside, or play inside – however Roark decided that the only thing appealing to him was 1) removing his shoes, 2) removing his pants so that, 3) he could take off his diaper. No, I don’t know why. He just wants to be naked. And then he wants to pee on the floor like a puppy. This of course led me to putting them in the bath quite early, because after the bath comes feety pajamas which zip up. So Roark cannot take them off. Thank GOD he has not mastered the zipper. I cannot imagine how we will contain his parts when that happens…

After their bath – which was cut short because Roark wouldn’t stay in the tub – they hung out in the living room with their cups of milk and watched American Idol. I know what you are thinking…you think that I watched American Idol while they ran around like wild men – and that would normally be the case…but for some reason they just sat there beside me, playing with stuffed animals and WATCHED THE SHOW. They were cuddly and cute and sweet and and and…amazing. At 7:45 after they had lounged on me lifeless for about 15 minutes I asked if they wanted to go night-night. They both got up and went to the door that leads upstairs. And those little boys got in bed….and….went to freaking sleep.

Last night was the most relaxing evening I have ever had with them on my own.

My Roger Clyne Crush

Roger Clyne and the Peacemakers is coming out with a new album. I am VERY excited. http://www.azpeacemakers.com/ecard/ has details if you are interested, and seriously – how could you NOT be interested? His songs are great, his band is great, and he is oh so easy on the eyes.

The weekend is upon us. Plans anyone? We are hanging out around the house tonight and plan to nudge each other every few minutes and say “hey, it’s snowing” which if you live in Dallas doesn’t happen very often. Everything is blanketed with soft snow right now and it is starting up again…very pretty, very peaceful, but a bitch to drive in. Tomorrow we have errands to run (although I could not tell you what they are) and then we are working out at the Y. And tomorrow night we are supposed to go out on a date…we will see if we actually make it this weekend. I am not counting on it. Sunday we have to run, although if we don’t…we don’t. We have a ½ marathon next weekend which I could not be less ready for. That will be an exercise in embarrassment and humiliation for sure. Can’t wait. Other than that we have a bunch of Netflix sitting around which we will certainly watch. Big plans…boy, howdy!