Cadillac, here we come

One of the things that we knew we would haver to replace when we became homeowners was the garage door on our house. The seller originally agreed to fix it but in her state of mental breakdown changed her mind. And that's okay because it was truly beyond repair. It was sort of buckling in on itself at the seams and sometimes wouldn't go down. It became a game for Wesley and I - before we could leave to go anywhere, we'd sit at the end of the driveway and chant, "Go down! Go down!" And then lately it developed another quirk - going up by itself. We would come home from being gone all day to find it wide open, inviting the world to come in and steal our watering cans and half used rolls of duct tape.

This week we had finally had enough of the garage door drama. Bryan called to get an estimate but it had really gotten past the point of being optional and had moved into the category of necessary.

I'm just going to be open about all of this - we're friends, right? So we had been planning on spending $700 or so on the new door. Because we just had gutters put on and we still need to put up a fence so the neighbor will stop complaining that Winnie poops in her yard. Bryan talked with the guy outside and when he came in, I immediately knew we were in trouble.

"It's going to be a little more than we thought," Bryan told me. But he was going with the guy back to the door shop to see if there were any on sale that might work.
When he had been gone for over an hour, I knew that we were really, really in trouble. He returned armed with pamphlets and shifty eyes.

Now, I had stupidly thought that buying a new garage door would be simple - you know, pick a color, windows or no windows, and you're done. I was wrong. There are somewhere in the neighborhood of 7 million options available and a good salesman will convince you that if you don't get at least half of them, your children will end up in prison because you didn't love them enough to buy a better quality garage door.

Bryan told me that it was going to be $1300. And that was a screamin' deal for this door. He probably should have told me to sit down first.

"But," he said, "this is the like Cadillac of garage doors." As opposed to the Ford Festiva of garage doors we could have gotten on our budget, apparently. "And it has a lifetime guarantee," he assured me. I didn't ask but my thought was, "Whose lifetime?" Because when Sam's Club first opened, my dad bought a lifetime membership. A few years later, he got a notice in the mail that it was no longer valid. And he wasn't dead...

But that's beside the point I guess. I tried to mourn the financial loss we were about to take by brainstorming what else I could buy with $1300. I could either get a breast augmentation in a third world country or buy about two tanks of gas. Either way, we aren't really giving up much.
Heck, maybe we should have gone for the Ferrari of garage doors. Wesley doesn't need to go to college anyway.

Do they make fur-lined flip-flops?

Every good hobby has an element of danger to it. Maybe you enjoy skydiving or riding on ATVs or horseback riding - all of which can be fun but potentially dangerous. In blogging, the constant danger is that you might (heaven forbid) offend someone. Living in a small town and having relatives who read my blog makes it even more likely that this will happen at some point. I tell you all this for a reason - the event that I am writing about actually took place over a month ago but I had to wait until some time had passed before I could safely document my feelings on it. I feel confident now that no one will be able to figure out when or where this happened and therefore I can avoid creating enemies.

Here it is:
Today I was forced to spend the afternoon socializing with people who epitomize what I never want to become. People whose natural haircolor is a mystery to even themselves, who talk incessantly about how demanding their eight year old daughters' pom-pon schedules are, and who probably use Crest Whitening Strips on their dogs' teeth. I have always considered myself to be somewhat of a "social chameleon" meaning that I can get along and chat with just about anyone - kids, librarians, engineers, PETA members, the Schwan man, convicted felons - anyone. But these women stretched my skills to their very limits.

You see, I've spent my entire adult life developing a disdain for people like this and all that they stand for - women who strive to remain 20 lbs underweight, have professional French manicures on their toenails and who wear fur-lined boots to the swimming pool. Women who look as if they just climbed out of the tanning bed year round, who have never had pudding between their toes or worn the same underwear two days in a row. These women live on streets with names like, "Better Than You Boulevard." And their idea of a "wild" time is going to bed without washing their makeup off first.

And when I find myself in the presence of a group like this with no hope of escape in sight, desparately wishing I was at home with chicken pox, it makes me really think.
I'm glad for the nearly eight years that I lived in Colorado and for the life experiences that have made me into the Laura I am today. Even though I don't always fit in here in Oklahoma, it's okay.

I'm glad that I am comfortable in my own skin - as pasty-white as it may be. But if I start posting pictures of myself in fur-lined boots (and they aren't pictures of me on a ski slope), I need someone to hunt me down and slap me. Promise me you care enough to do that.

things I need to tell my therapist, part 1

This week has been an especially trying one for Bryan and me. Last Friday, we actually for real not even in a dream closed on our new house. And we made it from beginning to end without a realtor. Don’t get me wrong - it was nice to save the money that it would have cost to use a realtor, but it also would have been nice to have not dealt with the sellers directly. By the time the closing finally happened, she had developed such a passionate contempt for us that we had to sign all of the papers in separate rooms. We had, it seems, asked for her to do unreasonable things such as: fix the garage door so that it actually goes up and down and (gasp!) that she have both toilets in the house be in working order. I know - the nerve of us! But really, separate rooms to sign the papers? Are we in middle school?

Then, 35 minutes before the closing, the lady handling the paperwork end of it all called me to tell me that I needed to bring a cashier’s check for almost $6,000. Okay. Except that our bank is in another state. I was just relieved that she didn’t need something that would be HARD FOR ME TO GET AT THE LAST MINUTE like one of my kidneys or Wesley’s baby toe in a jar.

So we closed on Friday but the house didn’t have power or water until Monday. On Monday and Tuesday we cleaned like mad beasts. Tuesday was our anniversary so Bryan and I were planning to have dinner. We stopped at the new house so I could show Bryan what we had gotten done while he was at work. It was then that we first heard the mysterious gurgling sound in one of the bathrooms. Ten minutes later we were both in the other bathroom, pantlegs rolled up, frantically trying to mop up the water that was pouring from the toilet. It was our most romantic anniversary yet.

Stay tuned for the next episode....

it could happen to you, too

In our town, there is a place called the Dugout where you can drive thru and get drinks or a gallon of milk or a tasty deep fried meal. A few days ago, it was unusually nice out (meaning that the wind was a calm 30 miles per hour instead of the normal 60 mph) and so the line at the Dugout was long. I didn’t mind though, as at this point in my life it seems that time is the one thing I have an abundance of.

So there I was, six months pregnant, very windblown, and driving my mom’s old silver Buick when I saw the car in front of me. It was a red convertible with the top down, full of cute little teenage girls. They all had cute hair and trendy sunglasses and tight little shirts that flattered their tiny little high school bodies. And at that moment, reality slapped me in the face - I AM NOT COOL ANYMORE.

I quickly dug through my purse in a panic to see if there was anything that could help me - lip gloss, sunglasses, anything. Unfortunately, all I came up with was countless gum wrappers, a pacifier, three peanut butter crackers, and a lint-covered prenatal vitamin. I looked down to see that my shirt was tight, too, but instead of being flattering, it looked like I was trying to shoplift a basketball and some dishtowels. I adjusted the gigantic elastic waistband on my maternity pants and gave up.

But it left me wondering - how did this happen? I USED to be cool, at least I think I was. It didn’t happen overnight which is probably why I didn’t notice. I didn’t go to bed "cool" one night and wake up the next morning wearing maternity clothes, a retainer, and with "crockpot" at the top of my birthday list. No sir, it was more like a slow leak in a tire that has now gone completely flat.

The problem is I’m not ready to be UNcool. I don’t want to wear tapered leg jeans or Rockport shoes . For crying out loud, I’m only 30! I need to regain a tiny shred of cool in order to retain my sanity. But how?

Is this what a midlife crisis feels like? Because I’m suddenly tempted to buy a motorcycle and change my name to Cinnamon. Or at least take "crockpot" off my birthday list...

it makes me so mad!!!

Last weekend, I took a little trip all by myself to Austin, TX to visit my friend Sara. She is engaged to a man I had never met so I figured I had better meet him before the wedding. That way when the preacher says, "if there is anyone who knows of any reason these two should not be married, speak now or forever hold your peace..." I could stand up if I needed to. Do they even say that at weddings anymore?
Anyway, it was a short but very nice trip. I got to sleep late, we took long walks, and I got to meet Sara's friends at an engagement party. It was such a nice and relaxing weekend that I felt completely unprepared for the cold shower of real life that I returned to. Apparently, Wesley was very sick with a high fever for most of the weekend. And you know what they say - sick baby, grumpy daddy.
I took Wes to the doctor first thing Monday morning and he tested very positive for strep FOR THE FIFTH TIME in five months. And as much as I have enjoyed living in a "den of illness" I told the doctor that I am tired of having a sick baby. He agreed and prescribed what I guess are the "big guns" of antibiotics.
This whole process of shooting medicine into a baby's mouth via a syringe has become second nature to me - like tying my shoe or cleaning mashed potatoes out of the dog's ear. So I was shocked when Wesley fought me so much on taking this particular medicine. The perscription said three times a day for ten days - 30 doses. By day two, I was having to pin him down on the floor to get the job done. By day three, he had perfected the art of spitting it out the side of his mouth. Day four, I decided to try bribes - take your medicine, get four chocolate chips. Deal or no deal?
No deal. Finally, I decided to taste this medicine myself - how bad could it be? Well, I didn't have to taste it - as the bottle got close to my face, the stench of a rotting animal carcass filled my nostrils. I almost threw up.
I took the bottle to Walgreens and begged them to flavor it with something even though they aren't supposed to after it has been taken out of the store. I must have been convincing (read: desparate) because they agreed to do it. The pharmacist read in the computer that this is one of the worst tasting medicines they sell and that grape or lemon flavoring would work best. At this point, she could have squirted Cheez Whiz into the bottle and I would've gone along with it because it certainly couldn't have come out tasting any worse. I chose grape.
My question is: why can't these gigantic pharmaceutical companies produce medicines that are both effective and tasty? Or at least that don't taste like rancid meat? And this is a medicine that is supposed to be specifically for babies!
But I am sure that the grape flavoring will make all the difference in the world. I mean, who wouldn't want some rotting meat with grape jelly on it? And maybe a side of poop-flavored licorice...

Would you borrow a cup of sugar from a crack whore?

About two weeks ago, Wesley, my mother-in-law, and I were driving around looking for a house to buy. We do this sometimes, in the absence of real things to do. We found one house that was "for sale by owner" and looked really nice. By really nice, I mean obviously out of our price range. My ever-helpful mother-in-law called about the house anyway and to make a long story short, a few days later we went to look at the inside of the house.

One of the things that I really liked about the house is that is has four bedrooms. I'm fully aware that families with a dozen or more kids live in tiny huts in other parts of the world. And I don't want to seem ungrateful, but there are days when our current two bedroom house seems a little small. Like living in the backseat of a VW bug kind of small. Of course, there were other things I liked about the house - the jetted tub in the master bath, the nice kitchen countertops, and that there weren't bloodstains anywhere on the walls or carpet - it's everything a girl could ask for!
I was careful not to be too excited about the house for a number of reasons. Primarily though, I wanted Bryan to decide the house was right for our family on his own. If there is one thing I have learned in 3 years of marriage, it is that decision making goes much more smoothly if Bryan thinks a good idea was all his own. So I didn't really say much. And it worked - he decided we should buy it!

So we put in an offer and the sellers accepted. And like everything else in our lives, it has turned into a lesson. Remember, the house was "for sale by owner" and we agreed with the seller that we both could save if we did it without realtors. Here's what we learned so far: buying a house by yourself (meaning without a realtor) is much like representing yourself if you are on trial for murder or removing your own appendix just to save a few bucks - the further you get into the process, the more you realize it probably wasn't your best idea ever. To complicate things, the woman we are buying from seems to have a case of early-onset dementia. She likes to say, "I never said that!" Also, unlike Bryan and I, Bryan and this woman were apparently NOT matched up on 29 dimensions of personality. They've already had a few "scuffles."

At this point, we are just hoping and praying that the rest of the sale will finish smoothly and without anyone needing stitches. This, after all, is the first house we've found in our price range that isn't across the street from a helicopter landing pad, next door to a convicted crack-whore, or with an ancient Indian burial ground in the backyard.

I know that buying a new house isn't a magic potion to a better life. But I also know that if we move, I won't have to start each day with my current early morning ritual: watching my neighbor, Delmar or whatever the crap his name is, smoke a cigarette on his front porch in his whitie-tighties. And that, my friend, is worth more than all the McDonald's french fries in the world.

Hello, everyone, my name is Laura and I'm a McDonald's-a-holic

Last night I had a horrible dream: my wallet was so stuffed with papers that they were sticking out and it wouldn't zip. Bryan took my wallet and pulled out all the papers and it turned out they were all receipts - from McDonald's. He read the dates and times from the receipts and figured out that I had been eating three meals a day at McDonald's for quite some time. He was mad. End of dream.

In reality, I like McDonald's. I eat there more than I should and I know it. It's definitely a weakness of mine. I probably eat it once a week now that I'm pregnant but it's not my fault - I CRAVE it - I NEED it. I know those fries must be laced with crack cocaine because they are addictive.

So after waking up from that terrible dream, I knew there was only one thing to do today: have lunch at McDonald's. Of course. After Wesley's morning nap, I loaded him into the car and we set out for the all-too-familiar terrain of the McDonald's drive-thru. Since Wes hadn't really eaten either, I decided to do something I've never done - order him a Happy Meal. And since I hadn't ordered one before, I didn't realize there were so many choices: burger or nuggets, fries or chemically altered apple slices, milk or juice or soda...After stumbling through the first three choices, I finally got to one I was sure I could answer: boy or girl. Oh yeah, I had this one! Boy.
But wait - then I saw the pictures of the toys that currently come in the Happy Meals. The one I assumed was the "boy" toy was some scary skeleton-looking creature with lots of small parts to chew off and choke on. The "girl" toy was either a stuffed puppy or kitten.

Now, as a mom, I know my son so I said to the drive-thru speaker, "Um, he's a boy but I think he would prefer the girl toy." Immediately I realized how dumb that had sounded but it was too late - I had already made my son out to be a sissy. "You want the girl toy?" the worker asked through the speaker as if I had just requested a turd on my cheeseburger. "Yes," I answered.
As we pulled around to the pay window, the worker craned her neck to peer skeptically into my backseat. I guess she expected Wesley to be wearing a tutu and a princess crown. I'm sure she was sorely disappointed to find my manly son looking at a book about animals, not holding a Barbie.

In a world where so much about a person is decided by one's genitalia, I'd like to think that today I took a stand against stereotypes. But before I take any credit for bucking the system or sticking it to "the man" I've got to remember that if I had just stayed in the kitchen, where I belong, none of this would've happened.