So that there is a documentation of the last few moments of our lives, I’ve decided to act it out for you. Naturally, it is written as a monologue. Feel free to use it at your next audition if necessary.

Oh God, Oh God, ok, we’ve got to go. Let’s go. Let’s go.

No, no, we can’t have chocolate milk right now, please get in the car. Move along, move along. Ok, no, please go faster. What do you mean you need to change your shirt? No, that shirt is not wet. No it’s not. No, it’s not.

No, you shirt is not wet. No, it fits you just fine. Please get in the car.

No, get in the car and STAY in the car. Yes, I realize that you cleverly got in and then immediately jumped back out. Yes, I see that you are now standing in the door of the car and refusing to move. No, please do not eat that candy from the floor. You know what, today, go ahead and eat it off the floor, just go ahead and get in your carseat. I’m getting frustrated because you are not listening to me, now get in the car.

Don’t cry. Don’t throw a fit. Please not now. Why? Because there is a catastrophe coming. What’s a catastrophe? It’s like a disaster. What’s a disaster? Uh…please get in your seat, I don’t want to scare you.

Absolutely NOT! You cannot drive the car! GET in your SEAT!

Why are you screaming?? I didn’t even tell you what a disaster was! Oh, oh, you’re scared of that fly on your seat? Ok, let’s roll down the window so the fly can get out. Ok, now you can get in your seat.

Thank you, thank you, thank you for getting in your seat. I’ll just put Evan in his car seat and…whew!

Ok, ok, now we can go. Come on, come garage door, open up.

Wait, where are your shoes?

What do you mean you peed?

Crap, we may as well just stay here. At least we won’t have to deal with those maniacs out there trying to avoid the catastrophe? What’s a catastrophe? Nothing, there’s no catastrophe. I’m just going to…pull out of the driveway now that we’re all in the car…why are you screaming?? Because of the fly again? I’ll roll down the ….

::CRASH::

We run into the mailbox at the end of the driveway. That’s what’ll get us. The mailbox will take us down while I’m distracted by flies.

So here are some things I must confess.

- I water down your juice

- I put vitamins in your milk

- During nap time, I eat ice cream without you

- I delete episodes of shows you like off our DVR if I find them annoying

- After you go to bed, I watch shows where people swear and things blow up

- I hide toys of yours that get you into trouble

- I throw out happy meal toys

You see, there are two big brothers in our house.

One of them is me.

Which is why this made me laugh.

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I just don’t believe Alex can have such a great talent for being concise, direct, or blunt without some help from his DNA. It makes him, to pick a word, hilarious. To illustrate, I’ve outlined a few stories.
————————————————————
Alex and I are laying in bed. I’m begging him to fall asleep. To encourage this, I tell him to cuddle an imaginary version of my sister’s dog, Kramer.

Me: Alex, hold Kramer close. Snuggle him until he falls asleep. He needs you to be very quiet and still so he can fall asleep.
Alex: OK mom! You cuddle Kelso (their other dog).
Me: OK, sounds good. Good night.
[momentary silence]
[Alex shoots straight up in bed]
Alex: Oh no! Kramer’s gone! I lost him!
Me: Where did he go?
Alex: I put him in the garbage. He’s dead.
————————————————————-
Me: ….7,8,9,10. Ready or not, here I come!
Me: Where’s Alex?
Alex: I’m under the blanket.
Me: Is he in the closet?
Alex: I’m under the blanket.
Me: Is he under the couch?
Alex: I’m UNDER the BLANKET!
Me: Is he behind the counter?
Alex: I’M UNDER THE BLANKET!!
Me: Oh, there he is! He was under the blanket!
————————————————————
Alex: I wear underwear and mommy wears underwear and Evan wears diapers and daddy wears underwear and Nana wears underwear. Everyone wears underwear! But not Lauren and Jason. A dog stole theirs.
————————————————————-
Me: Hey, Alex, do you have to go to the bathroom?
Alex: Hmmm, maybe tomorrow.
————————————————————-
(Out of the clear blue sky)
Alex: Mommy, you’re my sweetheart
————————————————————-
Alex: I peed.

Please welcome warmly, Mommy Oblongata.

When my son was an infant, he would get terrible diaper rash. When it came time for me to wipe and put Desitin on him, he would absolutely jump off the changing table. With my left arm pinning down a wailing baby, my right hand was desperately trying to get Desitin on its intended target. Very frustrating.

That was until the day I was suffering from a stomach flu and reached for the wipes to get some relief on my overused hiney. Have you ever wiped your sore ass with a wipe? It burns, people! And trust me, Desitin doesn’t feel much better.

From that day forward, I made it a point to try everything my son used. Overboard, you say? Maybe, but you have to understand that I lack the sympathetic gene. Years of “rub some dirt in it” and “shake it off” as a child really took a toll on my psyche. My logic turned to, if I know how terrible it is, I’m more likely to feel compassion.

I became more gentle when it came to wipes and Desitin. I didn’t get upset if he didn’t finish his puréed peas and appreciated the joy and delight he experienced with strawberry applesauce. I made a point to get my flu shot when he got his and would have gotten all the immunizations if they would have allowed me. I bought the cherry flavored Tylenol because it tasted better than grape.

I lived life from a baby’s point of view and realized, it’s a tough job! From the outside it seems rosy with all the no worries, no stress…but I guarantee if babies could talk that first year of life they would say, “WTF Mom, this sucks!”

(I promise you, Evan gives me this look regularly. You’re spot on Ms. Oblongata)

The more I hear the question, the more I think about it and what it comes down to is this: I’m not a writer. Yes, I do write words on occasion as a hobby. I also occasionally pay my bills as a hobby and I do not consider myself a professional financier.

Sure, there are some people in this great big ol’ blogosphere that are writer. Them’s ain’t me. Because even though I know that Punctuation Matters, I do not want to have to think about semi-colons. I am too busy making sure my own colon gets the proper amounts of fruits and vegetables. I’m also very, VERY busy making terrible jokes. You see, I have far too much on my plate, like fruit and bad jokes, to be a writer.

Furthermore, whilst blogging I do not have to worry about editors, readers, making sense, or loathsome book tours. I hate traveling for business. Traveling often means I haven’t slept and have spilled hot coffee all over myself. I can’t imagine how poorly I’d manage traveling to promote my writing. I imagine people would come to my book signings, see the shambles of clothing I’ve been traveling in and promptly return my book in disgust.

But most importantly: the writing. I could not, would not write a great opening sentence. “It was the best of times, it was the worst of times.” That is a beautiful opening sentence. $100 says that me writing a book would include some rip off of that sentence. Because utilizing existing material that is awesome in order to improve your own work…that’s called “leveraging material” right? That’s what we’re doing in blogging when we’re “inspired” by another post, yes? Perhaps it isn’t but….listen, I couldn’t get through a book without leveraging a little material. I’d even consider leveraging yours.

Then there’s the fact that I don’t think I could create believable fiction. What happens to me in REAL life isn’t believable. So where does that leave us? A book on a topic I’m interested in? You know what I’m interested in? War. I’m interested in why people INSIST on waging wars they cannot win. Why did Hitler insist on fighting a war on three fronts? That was monumentally stupid on his part – lucky for us – stupid for him. Why do people keep invading Afghanistan when it has never been conquered? That’s just dumb! The entirety of my book on war would likely read just like the paragraph above. Really now, would you buy that? No, no you wouldn’t. Because you could read it on my blog for free.

This post does not even flow neatly into place. And we think I can write a book? No, we do not. So I’m not going to try to kid myself. I’m a blogger, not a writer.

DISCLAIMER: If you are a publisher and were considering reaching out to me about a book deal? I’m still interested!! You should totally still sign me! Trust me, It will be the best of books, it will be the worst of books. I guarantee it.

Yes, yes I do roll over now

I gave myself a black eye!

Needless to say, there have been some doings afoot at my house lately.

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There’s been a lot of hype about the new Facebook timelines. I’ve read articles on how to use the timeline, complaints about the timeline, praise of the timeline. And honestly, all that’s great.

What I haven’t read much about is something that has frustrated me about Facebook for months. Tagging.

I’m not talking about being tagged in photos when you don’t want to be. I’m talking about the fact that from my phone, I can’t tag people in status updates. I can’t tag them in comments either. I have an iPhone. I also have a Kindle Fire – that means I have both an iOS and a Droid platform device. Still, no tagging through the Facebook app.

This is basic functionality that has not worked since…well, I can’t recall it ever working. Yet rather than fix this, Facebook seems intent on overthrowing Google. The problem is, in order to overtake a major competitor you can’t ignore your core functionality.

So, please Facebook? Please fix it? If you do I will wholeheartedly support your empire. I’m not kidding. I’m supremely brand loyal. Fix this issue in the next, say, 60 days and I will be yours for life.

Am I the only one this annoys?

Sidenote: Yes, I know this is a First World Problem. It still irks me that a major corporation doesn’t continually update their functionality. If they can afford to buy Instagram for a billion dollars, I feel like they can afford to spend a few hours getting their app to include all features.

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