larger view

About a year ago my daughter was in the kitchen when all of a sudden she screamed, "OhMyGod mom, come look, hurry! Come look at this rainbow! It's crazy."

I ran out to my back yard and sure as heck. It was like a rainbow on steroids. The colors were so vibrant and beautiful and magical! We both tried to take a picture but we were not able to capture it's beauty and magic. So we sat back and just took it in. I don't think I'll ever see one so beautiful.

Anyways, even though the picture wasn't the greatest picture I kept it just the same. Everytime I see it I think of that moment with my daughter. It was a little moment. It wasn't life changing, it wasn't spiritual, it wasn't eye awakening. And yet it was.

Here's that picture!

larger view

So I woke up this morning dreading getting up. My body hurts, I'm exhausted, my body feels so heavy like I can't lift myself up out of bed. I snooze my alarm then I thought to myself.. ugh I WISH IT WAS FRIDAY!

I finally drug myself out of bed, got dressed, walked out of the bathroom into the bedroom where my husband was waiting for his morning kiss. He giggles and says, "Hi honey! You look BEAUTIFUL today." We both have a good laugh because he's obviously being sarcastic since I feel like hell, and look like it.

Then I went downstairs,  PUT SOME MAKEUP ON... drove my four kids to school, still dreading the day. At this point my head hurts and I'm still thinking, "UGH I WISH IT WAD FRIDAY. 

Then I got to work and realized... whooo hooo! IT IS IT IS IT ISSSSSSSSSSSSSSS Friday!

I guess that's better than the alternative. Sometimes I wake up EXCITED to go to work, because I figure it's just ONE MORE DAY of this then tomorrow I get to sleep in. Then I get to work and realize, SHIT IT'S ONLY TUESDAY!

Do you ever have similar airhead moments like that?

Yesterday morning I woke up late, grumpy, etc so I didn't take the time to put any makeup on. YES.... I didn't wear makeup to work. Whoopty-doo

I got many "Wow, you look tired today" comments from the guys.

And a few "Oh no! Are you feeling ok?" from the girls.

The girls know that I've had back pain lately and sometimes I can't sleep because of it, so they are excused. The guys are just idiots. And I say that with much love and respect guys. But seriously, you're idiots. And NO I don't mean ALL GUYS. Just the ones stupid enough to tell me, "GOSH YOU LOOK TIRED" which basically translates into "Damn girl... you look like SHIT today"

But also.... damn... do I look THAT BAD when I don't wear makeup. YIKES! So today I'd like to extend my thanks to Mary Kay for helping me and many women like me look semi decent every morning.

So anyways, then I get this funny email and I just HAD to share it with you.

Behold the power of makeup!

larger view

I hate chick flicks. I do. I rarely watch them. And when I do I'm one of those that talks through saying stuff like, "oh come on" or "Yeah, like THAT would happen."

One thing I absolutely hate about chick flicks is the way they end. They always end perfectly. The guy gets the girl. The girl steals the guy from the hot cheerleader. And we’re led to believe they lived happily ever after. Well, guess what people? They don’t. Then they make us women feel completely inadequate when we face similar chick-flicky situations and it doesn’t end happily.

What the hell is wrong with me?

Why can’t I have that fairytale ending?

Why can’t I have a “moment” of pure love and sheer happiness?

What we don’t realize is… we DO.

Life is full of moments. We just need to keep our eyes open to them. Another thing we need to realize if it were “real life” that movie would continue after that happy ending. Because real life goes on. And it’d be full of the same kind of drama we deal with daily.

 I’ve been fortunate enough to have many of these moments and even more fortunate to have been able to recognize them. One of them made me bawl. When I say "bawl" what I really mean is "CRY UGLY". And it was all my husband's fault. (yeah, sure I'll just blame him.)

We were having a quiet evening at home. Movie night and one of the movies was The Notebook. I  really loved this movie because it’s bold enough to NOT show us a perfect relationship. I mean, they fought. She left him. She almost marries someone else. It’s “real” right? Well, as real as a movie gets anyways.

One thing you need to know about me is that I’m not a real sensitive girl. In fact I’m a little cold hearted. If you didn't already realize that from my chick flick hatred. But for some reason, this movie really touched me. I guess because I realized that in the midst of my husband’s and I fighting, bickering, family issues we might have, we love each other. And we'll survive. It won't be perfect. Then again, live doesn't have to be perfect to be wonderful, right?

Ok, so back to the movie. If you've never seen it, then this won't make any sense to you. Go rent it and watch it, then come back and read the rest of this blog. Seriously, stop reading right now or it's going to spoil the ending for you.

At the end of the movie, when you just know the old lady is about to croak…. … my hubby turns to me and says, “Don’t die before me, babe. I couldn’t live without you.” 

I felt the same way. No matter what family issues we have, I know that I couldn't live without him. I love him. I let a tear sneak out. WHAT? Don’t judge me. You had to be there. It was sweet. Of course I don’t want him to know I’m tearing up because then I’ll never hear the end of it, so I make a joke. I said, “Well then YOU die first. And we won’t have to worry about it, then will we?”
 
THEN… the old guy crawls in bed with his wife, and they… well… you know..they died together. 

And my hubby says, “That’s how I want us to go babe, together”.

I don’t know why this moved me the way it did. But it did. I giggled at first, to mask the ugly noise that was about to creep out of my throat. But then…. I started bawling. Not crying, not tearing up, I mean it when I say I cried UGLY!

Poor guy. He didn’t know what to do. He patted me on the back and said, “Are you ok?”

I started laughing/crying. I couldn’t believe myself. But the more I laughed, the more it made me cry. I cried and cried… I don't know how or why, but all these emotions were stirring up inside me and overcame me and were choking me 'till I couldn't breathe.

I was crying so hard that my body was shaking violently and so he tried to hold me and at first I didn’t let him. When I stopped shaking enough and I thought I might be almost done crying, I finally let him snuggle up to me.

He hugged me tight and said, “There now, baby! Are you ok?”

I started bawling again. And again. And again. The credits are over, it’s just a blank screen on the t.v. at this point. And I’m still “crying ugly”. And boy do I mean UGLY! Did I mention it was UGLY? Yeah, UGLY! And what’s worse is every time he asks me if I’m ok, it only makes it worse.

Poor guy. He is so nervous. Ha. He sort of giggles in between my loud sobbing. You can tell he’s so uncomfortable and has no idea how to make me stop. I could see him sweating and it was winter. Yup, that's how nervous my crying was making him.

Was it something he did/said? He's trying to figure me out. I can see his mind working on overdrive. But there is nothing he can come up with that would help. Nothing he says or does makes me stop crying. In fact, it makes me cry even more.

Finally, I'm done! He seems relieved, but still a bit apprehensive. We both had a little nervous laugh about it. And we went to bed. He snuggles with me … and well, whoa! Big mistake! This just triggers MORE tears.

In between sobs I ask him, "Honey will you please hold me till I fall asleep?"

He agrees. Isn't he sooooo sweet? Another "chick flick" romantic moment, right? Sure, for the moment. Then about 15 minutes later I think he realizes movie night was a bust. AND he's not gonna lucky. So he says in a frustrated voice, "Ok can I have my arm back now? I want to get some sleep". 

Ah yes! My movie moment was sweet and romantic while it lasted! ha. And now, back to reality. But that's ok. It was real. And it was a "moment." And I will always cherish it. I look forward to many more "chick flicky moments" with my honey!

Can you remember/share any of your own romantic/chick flick movie moments?

larger view

Last Saturday was an interesting day for me. It started out great. But everything else after that was something out of the Twilight Zone. My sister and I had decided we were going to take our kids out to lunch at The Marketplace. We’d let them play by the fountain for a little while. Then we’d head to the Color Me Mine place and let them pick out a piece to color. Then we’d go to Russo’s and let them pick out a book. Sounds like a great day, right?

Of course we get to the pizza by the slice place, and the pizza looks awful. They only have pepperoni/olive, and pepperoni. My 7 yr old likes cheese. My 6 yr old likes pepperoni/mushroom. I asked the lady at the counter, “Do you have cheese?” She looks at me like I’m a dumb ass and says, “We don’t have any made and I don’t know how long it will take to make it.” Then gives me a cold hearted stare that tells me she is NOT willing to make any either and if I have a problem with it she’ll kick my ass and throw me out.

I turned for a second to ask my son if pepperoni would be okay, when I turned back around she was already helping the next customer, when she was done with him  she asked the customer behind me to move up ahead. "That did NOT just happen," I thought to myself. "No way did she just let two customers in front of me, did she?"

It was finally my turn again.

“Well then let me have a pepperoni/olive and a pepperoni slice and two small drinks.”

I get the good ol, “What are you, a freaken moron glare” and she says, “We only have one size" as she sticks two cups in front of me.
 
I started laughing. I mean, no way that just happened right? Ashton Kutcher… WHERE ARE YOU? Am I being PUNKED? Where are the cameras? Seriously… there is NO WAY the service can be THAT BAD right? Then again, I am really hungry and grumpy myself. So maybe I’m imagining all of this. My sister glares at me like I’m an idiot for laughing after what just happened. Or maybe I was embarrassing her, I don’t know.

I say, “What? It’s funny!”

She is up now. I move out of her way and she orders lasagna.  She gets the same mean glare as the cashier says, “We’re out”

“What about raviolis, are you out of that?”

“Uggh, let me check.”  She returns, “Yes, we’re out of that too.”

Frustrated, my sister says, “Just give me a Caesar salad.”

I laugh some more, this time hysterically. I mean I honestly feel like I’m in an episode of Seinfeld, and she’s the Pizza Nazi or something.  To me, there is the typical bad service, then there is this… extremely hysterically-rude service. It’s amazing.

I can just picture it now, “NO PIZZA FOR YOU,” she would say, because I dared to ask about cheese pizza.

My sister says, “She’s probably just upset because she hates to work weekends and she's stuck here while we're not."

Oh well, we ate and moved on. I wasn’t going to let this woman ruin our day out with the kids. We go to the fountain and take some pictures of the kids. Then when they start to get carried away and almost fall in the fountain a few times, we say, “OK that’s enough, let’s go to the Color Me Mine place now.”

We walk in and there is just us, and one other gentleman. There are three employees standing in the back. We wait by the door with our best, “We’re lost and clueless since we’ve never done this before, can someone help us please” stares on our face, but nobody bites. Finally, I go to one of them and say, “Hi, we’d like to paint some pottery but we’ve never been here before, can you walk us through the process?”

The employee looks at me with this, “oh brother, here we go again” look on her face and says, “You pick out anything off the walls. The different colored paints are there on that wall. Pick a table, sit and paint.” No smile, but heck, it sounds simple enough! Ok. No biggie. Smiles are overrated anyways, right?

The boys picked out their pieces. We picked a table and sat down. Then we go to the paints, but we can’t figure out how to get the paint and brushes that we need. So we sit at the table, looking clueless again, hoping somebody will help. Nobody does.

My sister gets up and asks another one of the employees, and they point her to the party room area and says, “Go ahead and sit in there, and I’ll be right in to explain everything.” So she comes back to the table, grabs her stuff and happily exclaims, “Come on, they will explain everything to us, they will even show us how to paint!”

I say, “No, I think that’s the party room. There is a private party going on in there.” Then I ask another employee if I’m right. He says yes. I say, “Well, the other guy just sent my sister in there.”

“Oh, no, you can’t go in there, it’s a private party.” He says, then starts to walk off. My sister, overhearing this, turns right around with a sad look on her face and says, “Well then what do we do?”

By this point, I’m frustrated, the kids are frustrated, they just want to paint, why is this so difficult? So I tell him, “look, we’ve never done this before. We are absolutely clueless. They told us to pick our piece, find a table and paint, but HOW DO WE GET THE PAINT?”

FINALLY…  he shows us where the brushes and sponges, etc are. And instructs us on how to pick our colors, and write the numbers down so we know what’s what when it’s time to refill, etc. Damn. I didn’t realize it was that hard to get some real help. But we finally did. And we got started.

In the end, I go to pay and I give the original employee my credit card. The credit card slip comes with a line for a TIP. I laughed and asked, “You guys get TIPS?”

She says, “Yes, we do.” AND SHE SMILES! Oh my God… finally a SMILE in this godforsaken place. I was tempted to not leave one. I mean, they definitely didn’t earn it. But then I thought to myself, “Maybe the reason we got shitty service is because we look like non tippers.” So I bit my tongue, and to prove her wrong, I left a tip. And we walked out.

Now we’re off to Russo’s. I asked someone if they could check to see if they had a copy of Joe Hayes, The Day It Snowed Tortillas. They did! SCORE! The boys are busy picking their own books out, and they were also going to buy a candy, a little treat for being so good all day. I walk up to the front and let them pick out their candy, and ask the other employee if she can look up another book I want to buy called, “My Name is Jose On Both Sides of the River.” They don’t have it. NO biggie. I probably got the title wrong anyways.

Then all of a sudden my sister says her son needs to go to the bathroom. The lady helping me looks up and matter-of-factly says, “The restroom is not available right now.” My sister asks her son if he can wait. He cries, “NO, I have to go pee” She looks back up at the lady with a pleading look and the lady says, “The restroom is also our lunchroom. And there is someone in there right now eating their lunch.”

My sister looks at me and I could tell she’s thinking the same as me. “Did she just say that?” But more importantly, “Is this seriously happening to us, AGAIN?” 

As she is walking out her son asked, “Mom what did she say, where are we going?”  She turns around and says in a frustrated voice, “Son, she said she will NOT let you use the restroom.!”  She turns around and tells me she’ll meet me back at Russo’s once she finds a restroom for her son. But I decide NO. I’ve actually had enough. I call my boys, take the candy out of their hand, set it on the counter along with my book, and walk out. My six year old is upset and says, “You said I could buy a candy and a book.” I tell him, “I’ll buy it somewhere else.” And we walk out.

We finally head to car and as we get in my sister asks, “Is it just me, or did we get shitty service all day today?” I was so relieved she said that and so I answered, “Thank God you said that. You didn’t seem bothered by it all day so I thought I was just imagining it. Damn, I need a Tecate after all this!”

We laughed it off on the way home.  Good customer serve must be soooo last year's fad. Have you really bad service lately? Share your story here.

Does anybody else here watch Grey's Anatomy? Do you think Christina will say YES to the marriage proposal? What about Callie with George?

I think Callie will say NO. George is too emotional right now and isn't thinking clearly.

I think Christina will say yes. It's just the right time for them.