piecrust promises

Google! You've got me all wrong!

Ever wonder what would happen if you write a post about topless day and free Chinese food at work? Google gives you links to an Asian dating site.

I mean really...come on Google...is this the best you can do? First you give me nothing but ads about pie...and then there were the few weeks of everything puppy related...and then I talk about shaving my legs and I get all sorts of hair removal ads. Is it me? Or are you just seriously missing the point?

Perhaps I'm just not highbrow enough for you...I'll try to talk more about world politics and...and...crap. I don't know anything else that might be considered highbrow.

You've got me pegged Google...I'm nothing but pies, puppies, hair removal, and sketchy Asian dating sites.

Total white trash.

Home Again Home Again

So glad to finally be home. Home! Home! Home!

I can safely say that I will happily cross Atlanta off my list of places that I will ever want to visit again. I was not sad to see the back of that city. No offense Atlantans...it just wasn't the place for me.

Now I'm working through my glut of emails...hello wonderful people who emailed me! Kisses!

My work email is atrocious.

But it did have this one gem from my best office buddy:

"Did you hear that today is topless day? I’m having a hard time keeping my chest hair out of my coffee."

Thanks A...I needed that...but damnit...why do I always miss the best days at work...they had free Chinese food that day too. FREE CHINESE! TOPLESS DAY! And I missed it!

TYPICAL.

Things to do alone in a hotel room...

...none of which involve a.) masturbating, b.) the $8.99 pay-per-view movies, or c.) crank calls. (Sorry male readers...maybe next time.)

1. Open each and every cabinet, drawer, and closet in hopes of finding some left behind treasure.
2. Feel mildly disappointed to find nothing but the Gideon Bible and the Book of Mormon.
3. Search through Book of Mormon for 15 minutes in hopes of finding out how (or why) someone gets their eyebrows to do this.
4. Listen with ear to door as a husband and wife have what seems to be a highly ordinary conversation/semi-argument about the amount of luggage they were hauling around.
5. Discover that the conversation was totally worth eavesdropping on when husband asks his wife, "I mean did you really have to bring two vibrators? Wouldn't one have sufficed?"
6. Nearly poke eye out when scrambling to look through peephole at vibrator-obsessed wife.
7. Carefully inspect all mirrors, smoke detectors, and paintings for any hidden video cameras.
8. Do funny dance just in case there are any hidden video cameras.
9. Realize blinds are open and office workers in neighboring building are starting to gather.
10. Make split second decision...should you finish the funny dance or act like you were having a seizure?
11. Look under bed for forgotten treasure.
12. Find one lonely dust bunny. Feel bad for loner bunnies everywhere.
13. Jump on bed.
14. Feel mildly disappointed again when you realize jumping on the bed really isn't very much fun.
15. Take a ridiculous amount of showers. (Seriously...I've been here for two days and I've already taken 4 showers...what is it about being in a different environment that makes you feel so damn dirty?)
16. Realize now would be an excellent time to finally shave your legs.
17. Realize you forgot to pack razor.
18. Go to front desk and request complimentary razor.
19. Discover in the elevator that said complimentary razor is so cheap that it will only be able to conquer one of your frighteningly hairy legs.
20. Worry too much that the front desk will know that you must have frighteningly hairy legs to go and ask for another complimentary razor.
21. Have one silky smooth leg and one razor-burned-hairy splotches-mess of a leg.
22. Feel delighted that you accomplished shaving the one leg properly and plan on doing it again in another three months or so.
23. Worry the entire time you are in the tub that housekeeping is going to walk in.
24. Play the scenario of housekeeping walking in and seeing your ridiculously hairy legs in your head until you've determined exactly what your mix of shock/embarrassment/horror will be...just in case.
25. Feel mildly disappointed that no housekeeping staff walked in on you after deciding what an excellent blog post it would be if anyone did come in.
26. Pee with the door wide open...and be glad that there is no baby crawling in and out of the bathroom.
27. Miss baby terribly and cry for 15 minutes about a.) missing the baby, b.) what an awful mother you are, c.) how you haven't replaced all the sippy cups with BPA free ones yet.
28. Get distracted by funny commercial on television.
29. Realize that you can watch WHATEVER SHOW YOU WANT. WITH NO ONE COMPLAINING ABOUT IT.
30. End up watching a "Deadliest Catch" mini-marathon...the same mini-marathon that you probably would have watched if you had been home with the hubby.
31. Write whole blog post about what to do in a hotel by yourself.
32. Wonder if there is some clever way of getting the hotel to promote your blog and your brilliant list of things to do while staying in their lovely chain of hotels.
33. Think of nothing clever.
34. Realize list is suddenly not funny anymore.
35. Go back to watching "Deadliest Catch" mini-marathon.
36. Go to bed at 8:30. Feel pleased that you were able to stay up later than Amalah.

Traveling...

I'm in Atlanta!

For work!

This sucks ass!

I miss my baby!

I miss my dogs!

I miss my bed!

Hell...I even miss my husband! (Just kidding honey! I miss you tons!)

More complaints after my pizza arrives...

You can get a pizza delivered to a hotel room right? I've never done this whole hotel/business travel/expense meals deal before...guess we'll find out.

Seriously.

Dear Bag Boy at Publix,

I am not that much older than you. Seriously. You acted like I must be nearing my death bed. I'm only 27! 27 is NOT OLD. I'm probably only...oh wait...crap...ten years older than you. Ten years. Wow. Ten years ago I was 17...damnit...when did I get so damn old? But 27 can't be old, right? Because what would 30 be? Or 48? Or 72?

OK, OK, OK. I get it...when I was 17 I would have thought that I was old too. But still...was I that disdainful about the elderly when I was 17? Totally...old people suck. No way! I was a polite and charming young lady! Old men loved me!

My favorite part of our little interaction was when you could barely contain your eye roll when I whipped out my oh so stylish reusable grocery bags...I'm trying to make sure you've got a planet to live on when you're old like me sonny! Show some respect! But then you just couldn't help yourself, and I thought your eyes were going to roll right out of your head when I told you that the bags could totally hold way more than you were putting in them. I would have offered to just do it myself...but you never would have let me...I could've broken a hip or something.

I saw you eyeing my tattoos...and it was like I could read your mind...you were thinking that I might have been cool once. (Do the kids nowadays even say cool anymore?) Then...for just a split second...I saw that tiny flicker...the slow realization that maybe, just maybe, someday someone would think that you were old and tired and cutting in on their flirt time with the cute cashier. But then 17 year old youthful enthusiasm took back over...not you. You would never be old. You would never be out of touch with the latest and greatest. (Wow..."latest and greatest" I really am old.) You would never have some punk ass kid sneering at you.

Call me in ten years...I'd love to hear how that youthful enthusiasm is working out for you.

See you next week,
The old lady who might have been cool...like a million years ago...or whatever.

Meet the Players - Joel

Joel: You're not going to write about me on your blog thingy are you?
Me: Nooo. (Yes.)
Joel: Seriously...you aren't going to list all of my faults and whenever I mess up are you?
Me: Only if it's funny. Nooo.

Joel and I met a very, very, very long time ago. I was a senior in high school and he was in his first year of college. I was a super smart overachieving know-it-all who was also taking classes part time at the same college. I should have been enjoying my senior year with my friends. But nooo...I had to get ahead. So Joel and I met in an art class and I was ridiculously smitten by him. He was tall and funny and cute and oh so talented. And he was older! In college! Mature! I used to move my easel and draw whatever was on his page instead of what the actual subject was.

We went out a few times...he took me to Roy Rogers...I hung out at his house and helped paint his bedroom with his parents. I decided that he was absolutely perfect for me...and then...he dumped me. ON VALENTINES DAY. All of my young, high school girl feelings were crushed. I don't know how many days I cried...but it wasn't pretty. He got back together with an evil ex...and I got back with my evil ex as well and life went on...I never had another class with him and I never even ran into him on campus.

Fast forward five years. I was in College Park, Maryland, finishing up my second degree at University of Maryland. Joel was back in our hometown of Waldorf, Maryland...goofing off with friends and enjoying life as a guy with no responsibilities. Through a few twists of fate and the glory of the internet...Joel sent me an email. Or maybe I sent him the first email...I don't remember now. But I do remember the first awkward phone call that started out with lots of silence and then ended up lasting 6 hours. I remember the first time he drove up to see me...I remember his blue Focus whipping through the parking lot...and a memory from my past getting out of that car. It was surreal. It was like fate decided that we just weren't ready for each other back then...but now we had a new chance. We dated for the next year...with Joel proposing on our one year anniversary.

We got married at Disney World.  And thinking that nothing was left in Maryland for us...we packed up everything we had and made the very long drive down to Florida to start a new life together.

Now...I'll publicly admit that moving to Florida was mostly my idea.  However, we can put some blame on his parents...because they retired down here and our weekend trips to visit them and go kayaking made it seem like Florida was FUN! RELAXING! CHEAP!

But now that we've lived here for nearly three years...we see that Florida is BORING! HOT! EXPENSIVE!

If I could shut my eyes real tight and go back to Maryland, DC, or Virginia...I'd be back in a heartbeat.

Focus, Dana, focus...this is supposed to be about Joel.

How to explain our relationship...we passed each other driving on the 408 the other day...it wasn't a big deal but there we were...honking and waving at each other like idiots.  And that's pretty much how we live this marriage...we're silly and stupid and not always mature...but there is never a single fight where one of us hasn't made the other laugh at least once.  Joel is my best friend...and a lot of the time that means noogies and fart jokes...but that also means that I've got the best of both worlds...an awesome husband and the greatest friend I could ever ask for.

And he's damn good at picking up dog poo too.

Reader Appreciation Day!

A while back there was a show on Bravo that I can't remember the name of...and if I wasn't so lazy I would just Google it and find out...but anyway.  It was about a crazy real estate investor who had a whole entourage of zany coworkers...including a personal assistant who hated the scripted way she had to answer the phone which went something like what you hear at Steak n Shake, "We're having a great day here at (Insert crazy real estate guy's name here)! How can I help you?"  So she changed it to, "Hello!  We appreciate you!" which didn't go over well...but I thought she had pretty hair...so what's it really matter?

And that long pointless story is to get to this...HELLO THREE READERS!  I APPRECIATE YOU.

As you were.

I swear...

...she got in the dog cage all by herself, shut the door all by herself, and then proceeded to have an entire conversation with her baby...which may or may not have been about how Mama and Papa keep calling each other bleeders.

Thirty (THIRTY!) minutes later she emerged...only to have another very animated conversation with her baby...which may or may not have been about how if there is a Britney reality show she will so totally have to watch every second of that train wreck.

She then turned her attention on getting her baby up to speed on some serious gross motor skills...why isn't that baby walking already?! Lord knows Mama's Amelia's got the video camera in standby mode every second of the day waiting for the blessed moment.

Geesh...get on with it already...Mama Amelia has been patiently waiting for the moment where she doesn't have to carry her ridiculously heavy baby everywhere.

Seriously...the kid weighs 28 pounds. The baby doll is practically weightless...so Amelia really doesn't have much to complain about. Unless she wants to gripe about all of the pinching Mama does to those yummy tubby legs...but who can blame me?

I want you bleeders...

Guess who stayed up super late last night and finally got to see Sweeney Todd?

You're so smart.

God that movie was beautiful...Tim Burton...you've finally made up for the debacle that was Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. Yep that's right...debacle. Yeah, yeah, yeah, I know it was far more faithful to the book that the original movie...but still. The new version sucked...where was the diabolical Wonka? The snide commenting, drug induced, completely sarcastic Wonka? Yeah...not in that movie. I'll take the original, thanks.

But Sweeney Todd...I'm generally a huge baby whenever it comes to blood and violence...but aside from a few times when Joel deciding whether I could look or not...I managed just fine. Joel and I have instituted a new movie night...we had canceled our Netflix account because well...we had seen everything we wanted to see. And then after a year of someone (cough Amelia cough) seriously cutting into our movie viewing options...we are finally significantly far enough behind the rest of popular culture to get to catch up now.

I don't know how many times Joel and I have called each other "bleeders" in the past 12 hours...six, maybe seven hundred times.

Goodbye Dignity.

So I knew that when I became a mother I'd be giving up a lot of my former rock and roll life. I had no clue how far that would go...

You know you are a mom when you can successfully take a shit with 1) the bathroom door wide open, 2) a one year old alternating between playing the drums on the trash can and squealing with delight with every tug of the toilet paper roll, 3) one dog barking and running in circles around your legs, 4) and another dog trying to sit on your lap.

The best part is when you don't even flinch when your husband comes in and starts asking you about where to find the hidden rolls of blue painters tape.

Sigh.