Just MOVE!

The other day, we were living in walking through Menard's, like we often do.

We had just gone through the pool toy area, so we were standing in an aisle with the kids, trying to get them to put the things in the cart, stop hitting each other with the noodles, etc.

This man with his cart came towards us and I was trying to get Isa to move so he could get through while also trying to make sure that if he passed us, he wouldn't get assulted with any inflatable or foam items.

However, the 1.49 minutes that I was trying to get our family of four out of his way was obviously too long and too much of an inconvenience.

How do we know?

The foul words under his breath, the very audible shout of "Just MOVE!" and the crash of his cart being abused in his anger was the most obvious way.

Obviously, the five feet out of the way that we made him go, in addition to the nearly 2 minutes that he wasted, was painful for him. I guess we ruined his day, or something.

Either way, we have made non-stop jokes by yelling, "Just MOVE!" at each other whenever applicable.

And, we didn't even correct Isa at Menards after the fact when she twirled her finger around her ear and called him "loco"....

Coffee = Not Being A Hoarder

I think my biggest joy ever about having Netflix is the tv episodes. I have certain shows that I'm drawn to that we do not get on our television, mainly because I refuse to pay $30+ for cable or dish or whatever. So, there are some TLC, ABC Family, A&E kinda shows that I have caught when at a hotel for a conference in the past that I now have access to via Netflix. I'm really not picky. Old shows work perfectly fine. They are new to me.

Anyways, two such shows are "Clean House" and "Hoarders"....I love love LOVE them. And they leave me feeling inspired.

So, the other night was like any other night this week. Worked our butts off all day, then collapsed into the recliners around 10 PM and turned into tv zombies. Well, on this particular night, I drank a cup of coffee. Then, Jose headed to bed, leaving me to watch Clean House alone.

At least, until I hit pause. And began to clean. And kept cleaning. It was like midnight and I stayed up until about 1:30 or 2 AM. The crazy part is that it didn't even seem that dirty. I did two loads of laundry, cleaned the kitchen, the dining room and the living room. I went through some of our accumulating piles that have grown since we have been doing so much work outside.

Note to self: Do not drink coffee then watch cleaning and organizing tv shows.

Actually, let's revise that:
Note to self: Do NOT drink coffee after 6 PM. Ever.

The Yard Sale. Day Uno.

We survived day one of our two day yard sale adventure. My blah attitude that has snuck into my week didn't end with the yard sale, so I was pretty blah about the whole sale. I didn't even get around to unpacking all the yard sale stuff, and spent all day pricing stuff. I believe that 95% of my things in the sale are priced at 25 cents. It's not intended to make me rich. But I am hoping to get rid of my stuff. And what doesn't sell will be donated and then I'm done with it all (until next Spring).

Some highlights of the day:

• Using my Spanish skills to tell the cost to a couple people.
• Having a repeat customer from last year who reminded us that he bought 800 miles of aluminum foil last year, which he is still using.
• Looking through some random and weird stuff.
• Getting the stank eye from a 2 year old.
• Seeing my beautiful baby sister, a new friend, an old friend, my cousin and my aunt, and my neighbor.
• Joking about the rapture and zombie apoclypse that is supposed to happen this week. It would allow us to not clean up after the sale.
• Qdobas for lunch.
• Coming to the realization while unpacking stuff that Teo's pants can be cut into shorts. Duh.
• Selling a "moving picture" thing and then bursting into fits of inside-joke giggles afterwards.
• Poking Merri's very red arm.

I'm not sure if I'm looking forward to tomorrow or not. Haha! But, I'm sure it'll be fun.

Still Got It.

So, mid-day today, I stopped to get gas in a less-than-safe part of town. It was daylight, so really there wasn't much to worry about. I grabbed my bank card and stuffed it in my pocket, locked my purse in my car, and started gas pumping.

More than anything, I was stoked by the price of $3.83/gallon. Especially since my last stop at the pump, I paid $3.99/gallon.

A few dollars later, I stopped the pump and hung it up. And, when I spun around to return to my driver's door, a man was approaching me from a car or two away. He saw that I saw him and said that he was coming over because he was going to pump my gas for me. I must have given him a look because he reaffirmed that he had wanted to pump my gas. I jibber-jabbered something about thanks, but being done, and in all that, he caught a glimpse of my bling bling diamond ring and asked, "Aw, damn, ma, you already married?"

Either way, I immediately called Jose to announce "I still got it." And then to say that it must have been my rear side that attracted him, because until I turned around, that's all he saw. So, if nothing else, my bum still has it. Haha!

Ant

Since she was little, Isa has been super afraid, often unnecessarily, of bugs. Any and all bugs would cause her into a fit of screams and panic. I remember once, a couple years ago, when the army of ants began (as it does every spring in our house), she was sitting on the toilet in the bathroom shortly after starting to use the toilet instead of the potty chair. We gave her the independence to "do it herself" for the most part, so while she was alone in the bathroom, we were doing other things in nearby rooms. Screams erupted. Panicked, terrified screams. And we rushed in to see what happened, assuming she fell into the bowl of the toilet or that she had somehow hurt herself. Instead, she was sitting, bare bottomed, on the toilet seat, hysterical about the ant crawling across the floor.

Teo, however, is the complete opposite. Bugs are things of interest. He loves to get nose to nose with them, down on his hands and knees, checking them out. Watching them. Over the weekend, we learned of a talent he has. As I watched him, giggling with glee, he crawled up to one of those pesky ants and *swoop* in an instant, pinched it between his fingers. I told him to throw it away and he did. Then, he got down on the floor and did it again. And again. He only became distressed once all the ants on the floor were squished in the trash and he spotted one on the ceiling. And the distress came from not being able to catch it.

From that point forward, we have encouraged him to catch and throw away all the ants (why not? It's a free ant-killing service) and he has joyfully obliged.

Then, on Monday morning, Isa was recalling the awesome way that Teo quickly caught the ants as she spotted one on the wall. Then, before I could respond, *swoop* Isa, my darling daughter who screamed like someone was cutting off her digits one by one when seeing a bug, had an ant pinched in her fingers. She threw it into the trash and a huge smile hijacked her face.

Now, think we can put them to work with the flies start to impose?

A Pant Rant

My hubby has worked at his current place of employment for around four years (which is super long for us)...and he has the same uniforms he got when he started working there. The same exact articles of clothing. Which is fine, but recently they have began to fall apart. Normal wear and tear stuff, especially since he's been wearing the same five shirts and five pants for approximately 200 weeks now. Do you think your clothes last 200 washes (at least)...?

Either way, he was going to take them in, piece by piece and get them swapped out for some new articles. But his boss told him that they were thinking of switching uniform companies, to wait. If they switched companies, everyone would get new uniforms, so it wouldn't make sense for him to swap his out now. So, he waited. That was a couple of months ago.

Normally, I wouldn't care. It's his clothes. He's a big boy. Blah blah blah. He can sew a button when he needs to, patch a tear, etc. However, it's different now. I have been wounded by an article of his clothing and I'm laying down the law...somehow.

The other night, I was doing laundry and I went to pull the last bit of clothing out of the dryer, but my husband's work pants were stuck. "Oh crap," I thought. "The dryer has began to eat things." I thought the pants somehow got caught in the dryer as it was spinning. That wasn't quite the case.

On this particular pair of pants, the metal piece on the zipper, the part you pinch to zip and unzip, had broken off. Being the creative and useful man that he is, my husband "fixed" it. He took and hooked a key chain ring to it. Well, over time, the ring began to become unround or something, and what ensued was that his pants, were stuck by the zipper because the key ring was untwisted enough that it became wrapped around the vented sheet of metal that is the back of our dryer. I tugged, but didn't want to rip his pants, or worse, break our dryer. So, I reached in and tryed to uptwist it.

Somehow, the metal piece whipped around and sliced through the pad of my thumb. Ugh. I did end up freeing the pants, although the key ring wasn't so lucky to survive. And, I had a heck of a time moving the next load from the washer to the dryer and starting another load with the blood running down my thumb.

Does this weird crap happen to normal people?

Tiptoed Running

This morning, before heading to church for Easter service, Isa and I watched Teo run across the living room. On his tip-toes.

Isa immediately shared me that there was a boy in her class, J, who ran like that, on his tip-toes. It just so happens that J is also African American.

She stated, "That means that Teo will be black when he grows up!"

Um, no sweetie. That's not quite how it works.

Hahaha!