150 pgs, 15 chapters and 44,000 words

That's how far along I am in my trashy romance novel, and I just wrote one entire chapter that was nothing but sex. SEX Actually, it is the first time my characters have had sex. Up until now, they've been making out occasionally, but no sessytime.

Also, the manwhore has found that he is liking being married to a romance writer. I write big, long, hot sex scene, get my self all hot and bothered in the process and drag him off to bed to make him all hot and bothered.

Here is the URL for my draft on gather.com. I don't know if it will take you to it, or not, though.
http://www.gather.com/viewArticle.jsp?articleId=281474977100385
It might not be available for the masses yet, since it seems the forum is moderated.

On a totally unrelated note, we went to the Meet the Teacher night at Tues/Thurs School for Sam. When I signed him up last spring, I was having lots of doubts about sending him to Mother's Day Out/preschool. He is only 2, after all. But, since El and Em have started school, he has been lonely and bored. He misses them immensely and wears his little backpack all day long. So, I think that it will be a good thing for him to go.

Fortunately the money issues are starting to even out a bit, so we can afford to send him.

The money issues have caused me to download some budgeting software, though, because I dislike being caught without a safety net. What if that $1000 had had to go to some major repair, instead of my sil's bounced check?

So, a budgeting we will go. I don't intend for us to end up in debt every time we have some unexpected expenses.

I've taken my writing to the masses

The online masses, anyway. I've joined an online critique group. If any of you would like to and read my trashy romance novel, at least th first chapter, you can.

Go to http://romancewriting.gather.com/ You will have to join gather.com and then join the group, it's free to do so.

Please, be gentle with me. I'm a crit group virgin.

Holy hell.

Maybe I should say Holy Terror! That's what the Buddy Boy is being this AM. He just came up and slapped me. WTF? Time out for you!

Bless his heart, though, he's having a rough morning. He wanted to go to school, too, and had a meltdown when he couldn't go. Then I decided to do yoga and not walk today, so he was mad about that.

I'm glad we signed him up for preschool. (Preschool. Haha! It's Mother's Day out when you are 2.)
If he hates it, we won't make him go, but I think he will enjoy it, and it will make it easier on him when the girls are gone if he gets to "go to school" twice a week, too.

Water + electronics = not a good thing

I was a yapping on the phone to my mommy today and not paying much attention to the Buddy Boy. Whilst I paid not attention, he dumped my cup of water out on the keyboard. When I picked it up, water poured out of it. Pbbtt, sizzle, phhtt.
The manwhore went to WalHell and bought me a spiffy new one. (On a credit card, which I hate, but it will be paid for post haste.)
This one curves in the middle, which is taking a bit to get used to. But, I am back in the typing business after a very long day of not being able to type. lol

I don't think I've ever been this glad to see a check in the mail.

Vanderbilt has this annoying habit of over billing us for stuff, and we occasionally get checks in the mail from them. We got one yesterday.

Normally, I don't open the manwhore's mail. I leave that privilege to him, since one of life's little pleasures is getting mail with your name on the envelope. Besides, when I saw this one was from Vandy, I assumed at first it was a bill for something. God knows what, since they have a habit of sending us bills months, and at least once, more than a year, after the visit to their hallowed halls.

But, I spied the little words payable to next to the manwhore's name (this was one of those envelopes with a window in it), and I was so excited at the thought it might be a check, I opened it. It was a check for $76.30. I seriously almost cried. I don't think I've been that happy over $76 since I was a broke grad student, and probably not even then because I didn't have children to feed.

So now, thanks to Vanderbilt, we have about $250 to get us through until the next paycheck. Such a little thing, to cause such joy.


Now, before all of my friends and family get the impression that we are on the verge of starvation, we aren't. The bills are paid, and we have groceries and we have gas in the cars. It's just really, really tight. We can even still afford for the girls to keep riding, but can't afford for me to, right now. If it were bad enough, we could cancel Netflix and my cell phone and the riding lessons, and what not, but we don't even have to do that, so far.

So, in my absolute fury at my brother and his cunt of a wife, I remind myself that we are fortunate indeed that the manwhore has a job that pays well enough that we can be shorted $1000 and still make it work. For many, many people, that amount of money would be a catastrophe. It isn't a walk in the park for us, but we won't starve and the lights won't be cut off. Hell, we can still watch as many movies as we want through Netflix.

We are fortunate, indeed.

I'm still pissed at them about the money, though.

I'm ruining the neighbor's notions about me.

So I was told by one of my neighbors this morning. I had already been for a walk and then was out pulling weeds from the flower beds. She told me to go inside and eat some bon bons. lol

In my defense (like I need one), this was the first walk I've taken in months, and I haven't exactly been earning a green thumb with the flower beds. The weeds like me, though.

The girls are off to school, since no one else is puking, and even though I've not been well with a mild case of the stomach yuck and a cold, I want to get off my blubbery ass, so off I went. I realized that I've rather missed exercise. I like the high afterwards.

But good fuck, it was already yucky hot at 7:30 am. I was dripping. And I wasn't even pushing myself hard since I know I'm still a bit sick.

Also, I was dismayed at how fast some of the people were driving through our neighborhood. There are lots of middle schoolers that walk, since the school is less than a mile away, plus exercise walkers. One fuckwad in a BMW severed around another walker and passed so close to me and the Buddy Boy that I could have touched the car. Then he gunned it. So, if your middle school age daughter goes home and tells you about the crazy lady yelling at the car, I offer my apologies. Under the circumstances, I don't think "Hey asshole, slow down!" was too uncalled for.

The germs are coming, the germs are coming!

Run for the hills!! AAAAAAAAHHHHHH!!!!

So, El is home from her second day of kindergarten with a stomach virus. Fever Sat, puked once yesterday, thought she was better and got her ready for school this morning, and she puked again. She at least tried to make it to the bathroom, though, instead of puking on the kitchen table. Bless her heart.
And, now it seems the other end has it, too.

And the manwhore and I are both feeling a little bit queasy. Blech. Toast and bananas for all, today. I rather stupidly started the day off with a cup of coffee. I know realize that coffee and queasy stomach are not a good combination, and I have a cup of lemon ginger tea in front of me.

Plus, I'm getting stuffy, so apparently what the manwhore thought was an allergy attack was really a cold.

I think I'm going to flood the house with Lysol.

The couch again?

The manwhore has a cold/allergy attack or something causing him to hork and sniff copious amounts of mucus. Yummy. And, of course, since he snores, being all stopped up with 10lbs of snot in his head, he is snoring even more and even louder.

Last night, I gave up and slept on the couch. I'm betting I will again tonight.

Why is it that the victim of the snoring is the one to sleep on the couch and not the perpetrator of the snoring?

And they're off.

Off to kindergarten. Today is El's and Em's first day of kindergarten. The fact that they are doing kindergarten readiness (2 planned years of kindy, basically) has not really made this any easier. They will still be gone from 7:15 or so, when the manwhore takes them, until 2:45 when I pick them up. Well, not today, today is a half day. But still, my babies are growing up.

I was having terrible doubts last night about putting them in KR instead of regular kindy. You know, we're basically planning to hold them back, what if they regret it at some point, etc. But, this morning, when I saw that they are the smallest ones in this class of children with late summer/early fall birthdays, I felt better. Hopefully they won't be so small that they are targets for teasing and such. If they had gone to reg kindy, there would have been kids in their class that were almost a whole year older, like the little girl next door. She is Dec to Aug older, and outweighs them by 15 or more lbs and is a whole head taller. So, being little in a class of other mostly littles isn't such a bad thing.

As for me, I've shed a few tears. I was doing ok until Sam started walking around calling them. "EEEEyyyeeee! EEEEEmmmmmmmaaaaa! Where are you? Come home now!"
I burst into tears at that.

Musings

So, the birthday party was lovely, and we weren't inundated with toys. One giant Barbie horse and carriage was the worst. They love it, though.

We started the day with our first riding lesson, and I was so proud of Emma for deciding to ride. She was worried that the horse was a bit big, and she is, but it's all that's available right now. Belle, the horse, is a total sweetie, though. And frankly, she is more interested in taking a nap than in walking around in circles. The only way the girls could fall off this horse is if the horse falls over asleep.

I hate the aftermath of parties, though. We still haven't managed to get the kitchen completely pulled back together.

Oh! But my lovely sister in law (the manwhore's sister, not my brother's bitch of a wife) told me she thought the cakes were store bought. High praise indeed for my mad cake decorating skills!

Speaking of my slack jawed excuse for a brother and sil, they didn't show, and thus we still haven't seen any money out of them. Assholes.

As for me, I am ready for fall. 104* temps day after day is too much. I want cool mornings with gently warm afternoons. I want the smell of woodsmoke and the crunch of leaves underfoot. I want October's bright blue skies. I'm sick of summer!

5 yrs ago this night

I was being prepped for an emergency c-section, and more terrified than I had ever been in my life. I was 30 weeks pg, and after 6 weeks of bedrest, PTL and PROM, I was in labor and contracting every minute.

El was born at 12:41 am, Aug 8, weighing 2 lbs, 8 oz.
Em was born at 12:44 am, weighing 2 lbs, 14 oz.


Tomorrow, they will be 5, and they are 36 and 34 lbs, and beautiful and smart and normal! (Em has had to deal with PT, but she's overcome so much this year.)


So,the pics are Ellie, Emma, Emma's feet when she was about a week old, and the day we brought them home.

Happy 5th birthday to my precious girls!

Fun at the Fair!

The manwhore's company sponsors the county fair in the next county over (it's where the company headquarters is located) and employees get in for free on Sat. So, we went to the fair.

Only, the manwhore forgot that the ride passes were only good until 5pm, and we got there about 4:15 or so. By the time we wondered around a bit, it was almost 5pm, and the kids only got to ride 2 rides. But, there was plenty of other fun stuff to do, like finger painting in the science tent, and painting in the art tent, and playing farm in the Children's farm. We fed camels and goats and sheep and a horse in the petting zoo, petted bunnies and goats in the 4H shed. (Bunnies are really cute and most of them were for sale for $20 or less. I was very tempted to come home with a bunny, but want a dog, so no bunny.)

Then we went inside to the gloriously air conditioned main hall, and spent $30 on arm bands for the kids to play on the inflatables for as long as they wanted. We finally drug them out at 10pm. They were all asleep long before we got home, and we were able to shift the girls to bed without waking them up. The buddy boy had to have a diaper and a dry shirt, so he got woken up briefly, but conked back out. The little turd was awake at 6:30 or so this morning, too. *Yawn!*

But, we had a blast, so it was all good.

And, I have to brag on my Em. This child, who a year ago couldn't run, was climbing a climbing wall, going through a tire obstacle course and climbing the ladders for the slides on the inflatables just as well as El. If I can figure out how to download pictures from my phone, I'll post some.

I can't believe they will be 5 in 3 days. Time flies, and I wish it didn't. I wish I could have back some of that time to enjoy it again. Hell, I wish I remembered more of their first few months. We were so tired that it's all a blur. I wish I could live it again and have sense enough to ask for help, because we needed it and weren't getting it. But, we can't. Time moves forward, and life goes on. And on Friday, they have their testing for kindergarten, and in a week, they start kindergarten.

We're doing Kindy readiness, which is not really pre-K, but more like an extra year of Kindy, which makes me feel a little more emotionally prepared, but they will still be gone from 7:45-2:45, M-F, for the entire school year. My babies are really and truly gone, and I have two beautiful big girls now.

Life's little pleasures.

One of those is eavesdropping. How fun is it to get to listen to some stranger make an ass out of themselves in public? (Even more fun is when people are talking about something juicy, but tonight was ass making time.)

The scene: Red Robin, which is a restaurant that makes yummy hamburgers. You must eat there, if you eat meat. Quick, like a bunny, go eat at Red Robin!

The players: Me, listening. A group of grumpy old men, who look like retired military, bitching and complaining.

So, we order our food and are doing our thing. These guys are sitting at the table behind me and the order their burgers. The waiter is asking them how they want them cooked, and Grumpy Old Man 1 says "Medium rare."
Waiter: "I'm sorry, sir, the rarest we can do is just medium."
GOM1: "Well, I guess it will have to be medium, then."
Waiter leaves.
GOM1, to his friends: "Can you believe that? They won't cook my burger medium rare. What kind of place is this anyway? That sign says gourmet hamburgers! I don't want a bunch of dried up meat (me either, but I suspect that Bill will get old one day. Whoops, wrong kind of meat.) What is the world coming to, the government is telling me how to eat my hamburger. Next they're going to tell me I have to drink my beer at 40 degrees and not at 42 degrees. No way am I leaving this guy a tip. Damned right I won't tip him for it!"

And on and on with various rants about people trying to run his life because he can't have his damned burger cooked half raw.

I was mentally laughing at him until he started saying that he wasn't going to leave the waiter a tip. Then I got mad (the former waiter in me was offended). I mean, it isn't the poor waiter's fault that the company has a policy of not serving up a helping of food poisoning to its customers. I'm sure they prefer not to be sued.

Fortunately, the ordered an appetizer, and the manager brought it out. GOM1 asked him why he couldn't have his med raw burger, and the managed nicely explained about company policy, but said he would personally make sure his burger was as close to med raw as he could make it.

GOM1 was mollified. Food was served. He ate it. When the waiter asked how things were and if they needed anything, Gom1 replied that everything was just fine and everything was good and he didn't need a thing. Big ol' pussy man.

The trouble with people who garden

I have come to realize that gardening is just another form of pissing contest.

People who garden get off on bragging about how much bigger their garden is than so-and-so's, or they have the perfect variety of produce, because so-and-so is growing Silver King corn or bigboy tomatoes and who likes those? And look at how many tomatoes I have, cause I know how to grow tomatoes, yes I do. Or, the gardener grows something he doesn't like to eat because it was requested and makes a big deal out of how magnanimous he is for this act of altruism.


Furthermore, people who garden have problems with their understanding of amounts. You cannot tell a gardener to send you just a few of something, because no one will eat it but you. Oh no, the gardener will hear "Send me..." and that's it. His brain tunes out after that. Or, more likely, he was sprinting towards the garden, bushel basket in hand by that point. The only thing left to do is to prepare yourself to be covered up in fresh produce, and if you don't compost, you might as well start, because unless you want to get into canning and freezing, half of it is likely to rot before you eat it. I don't care how many mozzarella, tomato and basil salads you think you can eat, you will be sick of them before you are out of tomatoes.

Besides, I have better things to do with my time than spend 4 hrs shelling butter peas, merely to end up with only about 1.5 qts of the damned things. Yes, they are good. Yes, they taste better than lima beans (almost anything tastes better than lima beans) but if I wanted to shell peas, I would have my own damned garden. (Yes, I could have tossed them in the compost pile, but I have a thing about wasting food, so I shelled peas and watched all of my netflix dvds.)

On the plus side, I told the family gardener that my side of the family would be glad of some fresh produce, so when you see them on the girls birthday, be sure and load them up. insert evil laugh