Besties

On Friday night Nick and I joined our good friends Jeff and Dan to see JC Brooks perform downtown. It had been a while since we had been out so we decided to make the most of it and grab some dinner beforehand.

Of course we ordered the shrimp and cheese dip appetizer and in what may have been the most disappointing moment of my life our dinner came after I only had one bite of the succulent cheese and our table wasn't big enough for both but our waiter wrapped it up so that we could make sweet sweet love to it later.

The band was awesome and everything was rosy until we walked out and found our car was gone. As in disappeared. It was then that I noticed for the first time a sign where we had parked telling us that if we parked there we would be promptly raped in the ass.

I was mildly annoyed until I remembered something horrible... something awful...

Holy christ the cheese dip is still in the back.

I flipped into panic mode. We HAD to get the car back tonight!! The shrimp and cheese dip will never survive a night alone in the wild. I pleaded with the man on the phone to let us pick up the car STAT and explained that I had only gotten to take one bite of the shrimp and cheese dip and how would HE like to only have one bite of shrimp and cheese dip before it's stolen from you but it was useless.

We would just have to wait it out until the morning.

At this point in the night Nick and I had very different concerns. He has seen one too many Jason Bourne movies and he was up half the night developing a plan of driving through any barrier and getting the car back for free. Our conversations went something like this:

Me: Do you think the shrimp and cheese dip will be ok?

Nick: (looking up from his paper filled with calculations) So if I can get a running start I could probably break through a medium-sized pad lock and chain.

Me: But you'll be careful not to hurt the shrimp and cheese dip, right?

Nick: Of course if they have spikes I'm going to have to find a back way out.

Me: Maybe I could go in with you and put the girls on the floor board and strap the shrimp and cheese dip in their car seats to make sure it's safe.

All night I dreamed of the shrimp and cheese dip and how scared it must be. Finally the impound lot opened and we drove to the bank and drained the kids' college funds to get the cash for bail.

"Please God, let the shrimp and cheese dip be ok," I prayed.

We pulled into the lot and we were immediately greeted by the cast of Winter's Bone.



Right about here is where Nick is changing his mind about his plan.

We got home and I carefully placed the shrimp and cheese dip on the counter for a close inspection.


Closer...

Let me just slip off this bra...

Whoops my pants just fell off...

Nom nom nom

Oh that's good. *lights cigarette*

After the cheese dip and I had an adequate amount of time to cuddle, it was time to start getting ready for Nick's work black tie fancy party at a local casino.

We accidentally arrived at the party over an hour early so we decided to grease the skids and head upstairs to the lounge and down a few bottles of wine. Once we were warmed up we went downstairs where I made the best decision of the night and switched to double whiskey and Coke.

I was excited to get to our table because one of my favorite things in the world is putting on an hour-long Hannah Show to a captive audience. Weddings, charity events... no one can escape. But Nick's boss and other partners didn't think it was nearly as hilarious as I did when I demonstrated how I could eat a lobster with my hands behind my back and I was beginning to get pissed that my creative genuis was lost on these losers. But then... out of no where... the clouds parted and a fabulously gay man slid down a rainbow and landed in the seat next to me.

Gay men are God's gift to straight women and I was super excited that this party was about to get fun. After a few minutes he mentioned something about his wife and kids and I got giddy because I thought we had a tranny situation on our hands which would have made this the BEST WORK PARTY EVER but then he showed me a picture and this woman was definitely born with a vagina.

Not one to ever back down from a challenge, I decided I would make him my little project and by the end of the night we would celebrate his homosexuality and we would become besties and I would call him on random Wednesday mornings and convince him to cancel all of his patients and he would come over and make me the perfect martini and not judge me for drinking before lunch and then we would go up to my room where he would sit cross legged on my bed and I would try on all of my outfits and he would give each one a rating on a scale from 1-10 based on how it makes my butt look and we would laugh until our heads exploded about the time he thought he was straight.

But that didn't end up happening.

What ended up happening is that we did a mess of vodka shots and then he told me that his doctor found that his testosterone was low (yeah no shit) and so he was taking supplements which made him a dynamo in the sack. Then he put his hand on my knee.

NO! Besties don't hit on each other! You're ruining EVERYTHING!!! I cried as I ran out of the room. With my plans shot to hell I found Nick and told him it was time to blow this popcorn stand and hit the poker table.

Bouncer: I'm sorry, ma'am. I can't let you into the casino. You're visibly drunk.

Me: Yeah, no shit I'm drunk, numb nuts. I just drank about five gallons of whiskey and I've been doing vodka shots for the last hour and a half which isn't sitting too well with this rancid dip and lobster festering in my belly. Don't mess with me because I'm still pretty pissed off about the big gay tease that I had to deal with upstairs so please step aside so I can win some money to make up for the 400 bucks we had to pay this morning to get our car out of impound.

















Had I known that being visibly drunk can deny you access into a casino I definitely wouldn't have been peeing in the potted plant in the corner so we had to regain our composure and find another way in. I spotted an old lady bouncer and did my best pretend sober and we were in.



However, after two seconds of trying to walk in a straight line I fell into some dude playing blackjack so we decided it best to leave.

Of course we left through the exit with the bouncer who denied me my basic human right to gamble. As we passed him I said "thanks for the 400 bucks I just won, you douchebag!" and sprinted outside and hid behind the valet stand until we got our car.

The end.

Scale of truth - week 3

Miles ran: 7.2
Plates of rancid shrimp and cheese dip eaten: 1
Pizzas eaten: too many to count



Ok, so it's only down .2 from last week but I have been dealing with a minor set back. By minor set back I mean I had my first period since 2009 last week and I basically spent the majority of the week curled up on the couch crippled by mind numbing cramps watching my Dirty Dancing collector's edition while I poured the salt shaker in my mouth.

The thought of actually standing up, much less quickly putting one foot in front of the other, made me want to wretch.

But all of that is behind us now so it's back to business.

Ellie and the corpse

Last night we attended the funeral visitation of one of Nick's friend's Dad.

If you don't have children, let me just tell you that getting a 1-year-old, 5-month-old and 34-year-old all ready for an event where you have to be wearing more than tighty whities and a sandwich board takes roughly the same amount of thought and coordination as constructing an outlet mall.

There were tights, jumpers, bows... then I had to figure out what to put on the kids.

We were running out of time so I had to do something that I really hate doing... I put Ellie in her playpen and flipped on the electric nipple. I tuned it to the only childrens' show I find acceptable for her to view - Yo Gabba Gabba. It's like a big acid trip for toddlers.

However, when I got out of the shower and walked into the bedroom I saw Yo Gabba Gabba had ended and she was now watching Wonder Pets.

Like the name implies, Wonder Pets is a show filled with evil and elicits feelings of hatred. There's this duck and this weasel (or something) and they go around singing a song that if it passes your ears will be stuck there for all eternity:

What's gonna work? Teeeeam work! What's gonna work? Teeeeam work!

AAAAAAAHHHHHH!

I quickly changed it to Cops but it was too late. Like a zombie witch, Ellie looked at me and began to sing:

what's gonna work teeeam work what's gonna work teeeam work!

I started sobbing because this basically negated the hours and hours of my precious time spent teaching her the value of street credit by whipping her hair and smacking her booty all at the same time.

Anyhoo, Nick finally got home and the weather was horrible and we were stuck in gridlock traffic pelted by a wintery mix for over an hour. By the time we got there we were all starving but I know how these things go - it would be like two weeks before we got to eat.

I was waiting in the lobby with the kids for him to park the car when suddenly I got a funny feeling. The ground began to rumble, I heard thunder outside and I saw the pictures on the wall start to tremble.

Oh God.

It was happening.

Horrified, I slowly looked down.



Demon child was here.



Scratch that... demon children.



By the time Nick parked the car there were full fledged body thrusts, screaming, head spinning and levitation. Ellie would only stop screaming if she was on the ground and every time we put her down she elbowed her way through the crowd to make a bee line for the coffin.

I wasn't so much worried about Ellie having any lasting mental damage from seeing a dead body; I was more worried about her making the dead body her bitch and slapping him around before she pocketed any valuables he might happen to be wearing.

The minute we picked her up she would launch into a full on scream, complete with kicking aimed at balls.

If we would have walked in with a chimp riding a bedazzled elephant we would have made less of a distraction.

We were literally in the parlor less time it took to park the car. Nick briefly expressed his condolences to his friend and we made a quick escape, taking our starving stomachs to the only restaurant where screaming kids are welcomed with open arms. Applebee's.

As we were walking down the empty hall towards the door, Ellie's demeanor immediately changed. Her fangs and horns retracted, and she said in her sweetest little one-year-old voice:



This kid is a hell of a lot smarter than I could ever give her credit for.

Blogging for toilet paper

When I started this blog a year ago, I did so without the intention of commercialization. I was just a girl who had a few things to say about poop and hangovers.

But after a few weeks I noticed that many other bloggers had installed Google ads on their sidebars, and even though it made my blog look like a big hot mess I thought "Extra money for pancakes? Don't mind if I do!". But after two months of waiting anxiously every day for the mail man to deliver my big payout, nothing came. Then I read the fine print and realized I get like a nickel for every 10,000 clicks.

So I quickly removed them.

Then my blog started to gain momentum and I got my first pitch from a local PR company. I accepted because:

1. They adequately compensated me for my time
2. It was for a company who I truly admire (they do a ton for the community)
3. I had worked with the PR company a few times when I was working at the ad agency and I have a lot of respect for them
4. I was overwhelmed that someone actually read my blog and liked it well enough to invite me to write a review

Little did I know at the time, but this is not the norm. Immediately following this review I started to have email exchanges like this:

from: XX On Behalf Of CSNPromoTeam
to: "skidmarking@gmail.com"
date: Fri, Jan 7, 2011 at 3:12 PM
subject: Giveaway Opportunity with CSN Stores

Good Afternoon
My name is XX and I’m part of the Promotions Team here at http://www.csnstores.com , a Boston based company. We have been seeking out high quality websites and blogs, gauging interest in doing a giveaway with one of our sites.

We love the look and feel of your blog and think that your US and Canadian readers might be interested in a giveaway of a gift certificate valid on any of our 200+ sites!

Have a look at a couple of our sites; www.AllModern.com , www.Cookware.com , www.EveryGameRoom.com , www.PetsByCSN.com , , www.LuxeByCSN.com , or www.ShoesGotSole.com and let me know if you think that this might be something you’d be interested in. I’d be happy to brainstorm some other ideas with you if you’re interested. Alternatively you could do a review of something from our site.
Please let me know if you have any questions for me. I hope to hear from you to further discuss the details of the giveaway or review.

Kind Regards,
XX

from: Hannah Mayer
to: XX On Behalf Of CSNPromoTeam
date: Sun, Jan 9, 2011 at 1:48 PM
subject: Re: Giveaway Opportunity with CSN Stores

Hi Jamie,

Actually, your timing is perfect!

In the coming weeks I'm going to begin training for a marathon and I've been shopping for a BOB double jogging stroller. I am going to chronicle my training with periodic video and text posts on my blog throughout the next 10 months.

If you would be willing to send a double stroller I would not only be happy to do a product review but I would also include you in video and text posts as well as my regular Facebook status updates about my training until my completion of the marathon (if I don't die trying to run it, which is a possibility) in October.

Let me know your thoughts, or if there is any additional information I can provide.

Thanks!

Hannah Mayer
www.sKIDmarking.com

from: CSNPromoTeam
to: Hannah Mayer
date: Mon, Jan 10, 2011 at 3:01 PM
subject: RE: Giveaway Opportunity with CSN Stores

Hi Hannah, Thanks for getting in touch with me! I’d love to run either a review or a giveaway on your blog www.skidmarking.com. This time around I’ll be providing you with a $20.00 promotional code to use on any of our websites. It’s worth noting that not all items ship for free so please take shipping costs into consideration when selecting your review item.

All I need from you is a post prior to your review OR a post announcing the giveaway (we ask that you choose one or the other), depending on which you would prefer to do first. When you are ready to do the initial post, please link the term “tv stands” to http://www.tvstands.com as the FIRST link in your post. I would just ask that you have it flow as naturally as possible within the context of the post. I am currently responsible for improving traffic to that site, so it would be greatly appreciated if you could do that. Below is a similar example of a giveaway and a post prior to a review I recently helped set up that you can use as a point of reference.

· Review Teaser: http://XX.blogspot.com/2010/03/kid-essential.html
· Giveaway Post: http://XX.blogspot.com/2010/04/hurray-50-csnstorescom-giveaway.html We do have some general terms and conditions for the post:

1) The post should not be noindexed or nofollowed (if you have no idea what I’m talking about don’t worry about it!)
2) The blog post should be posted on the blog we agreed upon
3) The post should remain on the site for at least a year (can be archived)

If you choose to do a review then after you have received the item, you will then get an email from us asking to review the item on our site, please fill this out as soon as possible and we will be good to go! The review on our site will take anywhere from 4-7 days to appear, so please don’t worry if it doesn’t show up right away!

Please let me know if you’re interested in this opportunity and definitely let me know if you have any questions. I’d be happy to help. Have a great day and I look forward to continuing our conversation!

Best,
XX

from: Hannah Mayer
to: CSNPromoTeam
date: Mon, Jan 10, 2011 at 5:28 PM
subject: Re: Giveaway Opportunity with CSN Stores

Jamie,

WOW! A whole twenty dollars for hours of my time and months of hard work and dedication in generating thousands of blog followers that you can use to your advantage? Sign me up!

Not.

And, as part of the ethical bloggers code, I am informing you that I will be doing a negative review of your company on my blog.

And tweeting about it.

And sending it to my hundreds of business page fans as well as personal Facebook friends.

And offering negative commentary about your company on every site where I see you have placed a banner ad.

And writing negative Google reviews.

You shouldn't worry, though - it's only $20 worth of negative publicity.

Sincerely,

Hannah Mayer


That last one was after my daily glasses of wine but I would have written it anyway.

And then... THEN... this happened.

I got a pitch from a PR company to sit in on a conference call with a D-list celebrity who is promoting her new DVD with the promise of a Q and A. So I asked my Facebook followers if they had any questions they'd like to ask, and several did.

So there I am, on the "call" (which was actually a Web-X - you don't get to talk) and every question I had was ignored. It went something like this:

Moderator: So, does anyone have any questions?
Me: I'm interested in how XX got her own show on Bravo.
Moderator: Any more questions, anyone?
Me: Yes, how did XX get her own show?
Moderator: Well, if there's no more questions I guess that's it!

I later Tweeted about what bullshit that was and the moderator told me that questions about the show were off-limits. WTF? That's the only interesting thing about this woman.

So anyhoo, as an incentive for sitting in on a 45-minute Web-X where my questions were ignored and writing a post on her new DVD bloggers were promised a gift basket.

This is what came in the mail yesterday:



What.

Seriously... what.

They sent me toilet paper. TOILET PAPER!

Each blog post takes me between 1-3 hours to write. You know why? Because your time is valuable and I feel like I owe it to you not to just shit something out because you choose me over the other 500 million blogs out there.

Whether I have 1 or 10,000 readers I would do the same.

And I get toilet paper.

I write all of this publicly with the full knowledge that I'll probably never be contacted by another PR company to do a product review.

But you know what? I could give a shit. You all don't want to hear about that crap and I don't want to write about it.

All I can hope is that other bloggers will express similar frustration with working their asses off for nothing and companies will start compensating them for what they're worth.

Scale of truth - week 2

So I have some good news and some bad news.

The good news is that the scale is less this week than it was last week.

The bad news is that I think my friend Kim may have been kidnapped in the night by a gang of banshees because I get radio silence when I remind her to send me a picture of her scale. Either that or she fears the scathing truth.

Week in review:

Miles ran: 13.5
Miles biked: 5
Bathtubs full of pad thai eaten: 1



Not too shabby... down 1.2 pounds from last week.

And if you happen to see Kim -



- tell her she can't escape the truth.

The biggest loser

It is now officially 10:43 on Saturday night. At 10:43 on Saturday night I was supposed to be balls deep in a pool of martinis explaining the art of the stretch mark via pencil diagram to men twice my age wearing affliction shirts trying to pick me up while I dance with my Fancy Friends at Harry's.

Am I?

Well, not unless you consider sitting on the couch polishing off a six pack of Blue Moon Spring Blonde Wheat Ale (thanks Joe and Mariela for your contribution to our Super Bowl party, and by Super Bowl party I mean coming over and eating pizza with me so I didn't feel like a total douche watching the Super Bowl alone) while wearing the baby monitor as ear phones listening for the slightest wheeze that may escape my baby's lips upstairs.

I'm not exactly sure what bronchiolitis means but all I know is that on Friday she coughed something up that looked like a parakeet and I took her to the doctor and the next thing I know we're doing this:



Obviously that's a baby playing the part of Lila because she's fast asleep upstairs in a Benadryl-induced coma but I wanted to give you the jist.

The only good thing about this whole situation is that get to I put on my Bob Marley CD before I put it over her mouth and start singing "don't worry... bout a thing... cause every little thing... gonna be all right..."

So anyhoo we had to cancel our babysitter and I drew the short straw which means Nick is somewhere fabulous drinking in the company of others like normal people and I'm sitting here like a 15-year-old alcoholic watching Purple Rain. However, in my defense, before Purple Rain I watched a documentary on Sudanese refugees. So that pretty much cancels each other out.

Watching this movie for the first time since high school has given me a whole new perspective. Like every other child of the 90's, in high school I dreamed that one day I MIGHT be so lucky to find a guy as hot as Prince and we would spend our nights oiling ourselves up and gyrating on the floor of our parents' basements in the warm glow of a lava lamp.

But now... well, now...

5. Prince looks like a little black Polly Pocket on that big motorcycle
4. Watching a man skip rocks while wearing black leather lace up chaps may be the one thing that could turn a gay man straight, then drive him to shoot himself in the face
3. When in doubt, strap on a bandit mask, spray on some chest hair and cover your nipples in vegetable oil

2. I don't grab my crotch or stick my fingers in my mouth nearly enough
1. Ok, even though he's wearing a ruffly bib under his mile high shoulder pads, and his hair looks a little like a Labradoodle, Prince still makes my knees a little weak when he sings Purple Rain.

The End.

Baby Fly Paper

Every Mother has her own personal yardstick with which she uses to measure her success as a parent. It might be how her child interacts with other children on the playground, how she stacks up to other parents in terms of her disciplinary techniques, comments teachers make about her children, etc.

My yardstick is relatively short and simple:

Alive = good

Dead = bad

At this juncture of my life my only concern is that I put two living, breathing children to bed every night and that two living, breathing children wake up every morning.

This actually sounds much easier than it is.

Especially if your child was born with an overwhelming obsession with butcher knives and the inherent desire to repel anything and everything that will stand still long enough for her to climb on it.

Last night I had just stepped out of the shower and heard Nick in the bedroom preparing his usual mating ritual. You know, shameless begging.

I was just starting to work on my defense strategy of telling him that I think I have an STD when I heard a door slam and a ruckus in the nursery. This could only mean one of two things:

1. There's a kidnapper who is going to kill us in the house
2. There's a kidnapper who is going to kill us in the house

My mind always immediately jumps to the most terrifying and most improbable scenario. Like a few years ago when we had that earthquake and I thought my bed was possessed. Nick had already left for work (yes, it was 4:30am) and the bed started shaking. I immediately called Nick who was still on his way to work:

Me (outside on the deck, crouching behind the bar-b-que grill with spatula in my hand): Umm, either we just had an earthquake or our bed is possessed.
Nick: Ummm, I didn't feel anyth...
Me: Fucking shit! Our bed is possessed!!!

I spent the next three hours sitting Indian-style on the couch surrounded by bibles and crosses and commanding the demon to exit. And no, it didn't occur to me to turn on the TV or radio. When it was finally time to get ready for work I was terrified to take a shower and I kept peeking around the curtain because I was sure that little girl from The Exorcist was going to be sitting on our toilet taking a dump.

By the time I got to work I was completely strung out and I was thinking of ways to tell my boss that I would need to take some time off because I had to take care of the mattress demon possession situation. When I walked in and heard people talking about an earthquake I was so fucking relieved and exhausted I had to fake sick to go home and finish washing the shampoo out of my hair because I had been too scared to complete my shower.

Anyhoo, I was certain there was a kidnapper in our midst so I yelled to Nick to grab the weapon.

The weapon being a curtain rod we keep under the bed, of course.

I swung open the door, and to my surprise, there was Ellie, pushing her clothes hamper around the nursery.



1. She cheated death by not breaking her neck when scaling out of the crib
2. She cheated death by not falling down 17 stairs
3. She cheated death because she chose to push the laundry hamper around vs. drinking the bottle of baby Benadryl sitting on the dresser.

What I'm saying is she cheated death.

My relief quickly turned to panic when I realized I didn't know what the HELL I was going to do now. She's can't be trusted to go to sleep without forced confinement. How am I going to get my six hour break every afternoon if she's all up in my mix?

So we came up with this solution:



Yes, that is duct tape. It sort of works on the same premise as fly paper.

So far so good.

The Hangover: Part Holy Shit

Ah, Kansas City. Where mullets go to find girlfriends and multiply. Over the weekend Nick and I travelled there to attend the wedding of one of his college friends, Heath. It's always an interesting time when I hang out with his college friends because even though they're all now in their mid-30s I can only identify them by the horrific college stories Nick has burned into my head.

So most of the night I follow him around whispering things in his ear like "is that the one that got expelled because he shit in the hallway?" and "is that the one who violated his girlfriend with a Miller Light bottle?"

We made a small detour on the way long enough to slow the car down and push the car seats out in front of my parents' house in Planet Ozark, which made our usually 4-hour trip an enjoyable little 7-hour trek.

Coincidentally, Nick's friend Heath happened to be marrying a girl also from Planet Ozark, and even more coincidentally lives in the house next door to my Grandma.

AKA Mimi.

Please allow me to introduce you to Mimi.

Mimi only cares about three things in life:

1. Her dog
2. The television reception from her satellite dish
3. Cowgirl cigarettes

Coming in a close fourth is Zima. And by Zima I mean a Zima bottle that she fills up with straight vodka so people won't give her shit about drinking straight vodka all day.

Things Mimi does NOT care about are lung cancer, cirrhosis, wiping down her counter tops, changing clothes or any channel other than the Game Show Network.

Throughout her adult life she has had a revolving door of generic little fluffy dogs with an average life span of 3-5 years. If they don't die of lung cancer by that time that's about how long it takes for them to fashion a noose out of the dog leash she never walks them with to hang themselves in order to avoid watching one more episode of Card Sharks.

Anyhoo, road trips like this are what Nick lives for because he is able to have 7 hours of uninterrupted time to make sweet sweet love to his soda. As I've mentioned before, the man's farts smell like Diet Dr. Pepper. He is a daily regular at the 7-11 and offers medical advice to Jimmy, the Pakistani cashier, in exchange for free Double Gulps.

In fact, Nick's love for soda is so universally understood that when we got to K.C. his friend J.T. was excited to see him and ask if he'd had a chance to try Mr. Pibb Extreme.

J.T. then went on to describe this soda as "legit".



The last time I heard anyone describe anything as "legit" was in 1994 when two white dudes wearing Jamz were standing in front of a strip mall car stereo shop installing sub woofers and discussing the new Offspring album.

By the time we rolled into K.C., Snoop was bumping the bass of my Honda Accord and two cold beers cleverly hidden in brown bags jumped into our hands.

However, any enjoyment garnered from these sinful vices was squelched like a cockroach over the painful duration of the two-hour Catholic ceremony.

Conducted in Latin.

With every passing moment my Spanx passed almost as much judgement on me as the statue of Jesus up front giving me the stink eye.

Finally the ceremony was over and those who hadn't starved to death (only the Catholics were allowed to go forward for the snack) headed over to the reception.

We rode with Nick's friends Matt and Elisa in a nice three bedroom, one and a half bath SUV. Seriously, there was a camera in the back of this thing so the driver could watch as he rolled over homeless people with the TV monitor on the dash board.

On the way Elisa had to run in to Walgreens and grab a card and while walking out the wind caught her skirt and it went flying over her head, reminiscent of Marilyn Monroe in The Seven Year Itch.

But except instead of a feisty ole chap in a flannel suit and a fedora giving an amused and curious glance it was a gang of street urchins snacking on their toe nails ready to stab each other with an AIDS riddled kitchen knife for the opportunity to pluck out a strand of Elisa's hair. And instead of wearing white granny panties she was wearing dental floss.



Elisa is about 14 feet tall and weighs about 88 pounds, 86 of which are evenly dispersed between her boobs and her ass. So we quickly had to shift the boat into attack mode and engage the cannons.

We finally made it to the reception and I made a bee line for the bar to try to salvage any shred of a buzz I had before the ceremony. When I asked the bartender if they had any whiskey he told me my choices were Merlot (pronounced mer-LOT), or if I wanted something stronger they had chardonnay. And then he told me that if I wanted to tone down the chardonnay he could do half Sprite and half chardonnay.

I told him just to give me one of those cups of keg beer.

At that point my liver anticipated what was going to happen that night and stood at attention, gave a military salute to my spleen, pulled out a revolver and shot itself in the head.

The problem with getting drunk at these events is that the minute anyone catches a buzz they immediately violate Elisa. Men, women, men of the cloth... no one is immune to her spell. I started by pulling up her skirt every time she wasn't looking and at one point I saw the bride's mother trying to dry hump her leg.

By the end of the night Elisa was hiding in the bathroom straddling a frozen turkey while looking up the number for a safe house.

Much of the night is patchy but one thing I do remember is Nick leaning over to a newlywed couple we just met and explaining from a biological standpoint and Matt explaining from a romantic standpoint why it's called dining at the Y. It came complete with a pencil drawn diagram on a napkin, a very intrigued wife, and the rationale that you don't call it dining at the T because the only thing they serve there is salty nuts.

On the way home the next day we swung through my hometown of Sedalia and I was glad to see that nothing has changed with the industry.



And yes, of course we stopped.

Scale of Truth: week 1 (bitches)

Here's a quick snapshot of the first week of the Scale of Truth:

Miles ran: 16.2
Number of times I shit my pants mid-run: 1/2
Number of psychotic geese that chased me down the block: 2
Number of plastic geese that looked like real psychotic geese: 2
Number of cat calls: 1
Number of cat calls intended for the woman behind me that I thought were for me: 1

So here it is...



That's 2.2 pounds, bitches. Talk about accountability. I can't tell you the number of things I started to put in my mouth but spit out because of the knowledge that thousands of people would be looking at my weight today. So thanks for being such judgemental assholes.

Oh, and please allow me to introduce my friend Kim.



Kim is a good friend from college and her maiden name rhymes with Puber so that's what we called her. But you can just call her Kim.

Or Puber.

She once dated someone from Rolla whose last four digits of his phone number were CAMP which was really handy when we would take a road trip down there and wake up having no idea where the hell we were.

The other interesting fact about Kim is that any time she is agitated by anyone or anything she calls it a jerk, including her Wii Fit.



If you want to jump on the scale of truth train with us, just shoot me an email with a picture of your scale at skidmarking@gmail.com.

With friends like these...

Last night I had dinner with my single friend Angie. It was her birthday and she got free guacamole.

Me: I can't believe I'm drinking beer. I'm supposed to be on a diet. I have to get on a scale in front of thousands of people on Monday.

Angie: You need to give yourself a break every once in a while from a diet.

Me: I've only been on the diet for six hours.

Angie: *scrunches face up* ooooh.

*eyes light up, points finger in air* Or... you could drink so much you throw up and then it would be like you never even had dinner. Win win.

*takes bite of burrito*


In good times...




In bad times...



I'll be on your side forever more...



That's what friends are for...

Scale of truth

A few weeks ago my friend Stacey totally called me out on flaking out on the Pants of Truth.

I told her it was because the pants didn't really represent weight loss and nobody could tell any difference from week to week and she cut me off mid-sentence and told me to stop acting like a big douchebag.

"What does she know" I thought as I sat down on the couch with a bag of Mips (M&Ms and chips all wonderfully mixed in a bowl together) and split the ass out of my pajama pants.

Splitting the ass out of your pajama pants is hitting rock bottom. If I were a heroin addict it's the equivalent of getting down on all fours in the back of a big rig and giving a trucker named Dean the Cleveland Steamer for a few extra bucks.

It's that bad.

So I'm going to do something I've been thinking about doing for a while.

Ladies and gentleman... may I present... the Scale of Truth.

Ok... here I go.



Right... now.






Now.






Ok... seriously. Right now.




*holds breath and closes eyes real tight*



AAAAAAAAH!








I swear I didn't think it was going to be an ounce over 168.2.

So there it is. And it's going to be every Monday morning until the second number is a 4, like it was before I got pregnant with Ellie.

If anyone would like to join me with their own scale of truth, email me at skidmarking@gmail.com.

Lord give me strength. And a new pair of pajama pants.

Big League Chew

With the exception of my current dentist (who also happens to be my sister-in-law) I have had very bad luck in my selection of dentists.

When I first moved to the city I chose a dentist based on his close proximity to my work because I thought I could slip and out for a quickie cleaning over my lunch hour. Little did I know that he also had the intention of slipping something in and out.

The entire cleaning he kept lifting up my bib and complimenting my shirt. Now, everyone knows I have a nice rack, but come on! Let's be a little more subtle. And stop rubbing that suction hose all over my lips then jamming it in my mouth.

The second dentist I chose because after my appointment with Dr. Creepy Rape my company changed insurance providers and he was the only one in the entire metro area who accepted our shitty plan. I stepped in and everything seemed normal as the tech performed the x-rays. But then the doctor came over, sat down and said "well... yo teef juss ain't happa".

Oh no you didn't just speak jive about my teeth.

Then I was escorted into a locked room a for over an hour while a guy who smelled like baby powder and had gold teeth pressured me to spend eight thousand dollars on some procedure where they stuck a straw in my gums.



I actually had to sign three releases when I told him I just wanted to leave.

All of this is unfortunate because when it comes to teeth genetics are not on my side. Well, genetics and something that I like to call the Big League Chew. The Big League Chew is a little snack where I quarter a Ding Dong and stuff it in the little pocket in between my gum and my cheek. Then I take a big swig of Cherry Coke and work it under the Ding Dong. I just like to let it sit there and try to let my body naturally absorb the chocolate cherry fizzy goodness while I paint my toenails.

The Big League Chew comes with a hefty price - I had three cavities to fill this morning. But my sister-in-law happens to be the very best dentist in the entire city and not once has she ever tried to cop a feel. Though every once in a while I think I catch a satisfactory gleam in her eye as she drills on the teeth of the girl who makes out with her brother.

Apparently one of the cavities was deep enough to see all the way to my brain because she really had to numb me up good. By the time I left to pick up Ellie from pre-school I couldn't feel anything from the roots of my hair to my left ass cheek.

My big concern, though, was not so much the numbness in my mouth but getting to Ellie's pre-school on time because I'm still trying to redeem myself from the time two weeks ago when I got lost and I was 25 minutes late picking her up.

I've never lost at anything and I sure as shit am not going to lose at Mom. I may have gotten off to a rocky start by being 25 minutes late on her second day but I WILL be crowned Lord and Master Best Pre-School Mom Ever in the history of the world.

Teacher: Ellie did great today!

Me: Scooby tube blubber.

Teacher: Ummm, here's her coat.

Me: Bobba cab hubba doobie.

Teacher: See you tomorrow!

Me (shaking head): No! Goober boobie! GOOBER... BOOBIE!

Teacher: Ok, bye bye!

Me: Boobie?

I may have to bribe the Pre-School Lord and Master judges.

what.

As I previously mentioned, I was out of town for four days last week at a blogger conference. I left explicit instructions with Nick including a schedule of their daily routine and lists of games and activities they like. I even pulled the food out of the pantry and lined it up on the counter in chronological eating order.

I guess I wasn't specific enough.

Me: Why are there safety pins on the girls' dresser?

Nick: Well, Lila was rolling over in her crib a lot and I was afraid she was going to suffocate so I...

Me (thinking): Please dear Lord in heaven, merciful Jesus, with your flowing hair and righteous beard, please father son holy ghost almighty Galilee virgin unto you thy servants testament Israel glory don't let him say what I think he's going to say

Nick: ...pinned her pajamas to the mattress.

Me: what.

Nick: And it worked like a charm. See how happy and alivey she is?

Me: what.

Nick: Don't go getting all judgey because I didn't stick EXACTLY to your schedule, Miss Rigid. You parent your way, I parent mine. (takes bite of apple)

Me: You mean the legal way?

Nick: Let's not split hairs here.