Bless Your Heart

My MIL’s an Action Hero

One of the presents we bought for my MIL for Mother’s Day is a Librarian Action Figure with Amazing Shushing Motion! We could not wait for her to get past the normal gifts we got her so she could open the action figure. My MIL is a librarian just in case you haven’t guessed. Man, I wish I had an action figure- mine would come with an Incredible Ability To Drop Things! and Spotty Short Term Memory! oh, and of course, Inability To Back Car Up Without Hitting Things!

The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly



Good

Mother’s Day was ok, I got through it. It’s a tough day for someone like me who wants to be a mom so badly. Now, on to matters at hand. I have 2 friends named “Linda”. There’s Good Linda who I used to work with a while ago, who I scrapbook with, who’s kids I adore.

Bad

Then there is Bad Linda. I’ve mentioned her here before. A couple months ago about making inappropriate comments about my husband. I’ve made some adjustments since then, I don’t see her as much (we went to the same church and I’ve taken the opportunity to change churches since we moved to another town anyway), and after my surgery I’ve been able to avoid her at the social situations (dinner club, etc) where I’d see her. She did drop by to visit me a few times post surgery, and at that point I still wasn’t savvy to her intentions (and was still desperately trying to give her the benefit of the doubt). Well, things have come to a head and it’s gonna get ugly.

Ugly

The ugly started a couple weeks ago, when I realized how paranoid she’s made me with her comments. I overreacted to a well meaning girlfriend who was just trying to make me laugh and instead I got angry thinking “oh great, now she’s got a thing for my husband too!”. But of course she doesn’t. But Bad Linda does. Turns out BL’s been all of the sudden shopping at my husband’s store. He didn’t want to upset me (since things have been so stressful already) so he didn’t mention it. Until now. It seems that while I was away visiting my grandmother for mother’s day, BL made a point to drop in to his store and let him know that her boyfriend is still out of town, and since I’m still recovering if he wants to drop by and see her it would be just fine. And don’t worry, Shannon doesn’t have to know. Nice. And for the love of Pete- we’re supposed to be church friends! So of course my husband told me and he’s going to discuss with his manager if there’s some way they can officially ban her from the store, but until then, I have to find some way, and time, to confront her, and to end what I thought was a good friendship. We’ve been friends for 5 years now, and this just sucks. With all of our infertility issues, I really don’t need this kind of stress.

Shocked and Appalled

Ok, I can see now. And I have 2 things to discuss. A) How could Jon let me near the computer when I was blind? I read my post and it was like reading a transcript of that late night phone call you make to your recent ex when you are so drunk you just looooove everybody but you still have a few things to get off your chest when it comes to him. So please don’t think any less of me people.

Secondly, I look like what would happen if a lumberjack and Peter Pan had a baby. Apparently they have amazing lighting at the salon because how could I have walked out of there looking like this and paying them for it?? My hair is dark like Marie Osmond, short (which would be ok under the right circumstances), and generally pitiful looking. Here’s hoping a shower and a good dose of my own product will bring this mop back to life. Pray for me.

As A Battr

I just got back from the eye doctor. I can’t believe they let me drive home. I can’ t see a thing. I can tell I’m on the blogger page, but that’s about it. My eyes are all dialeetesd. I guess that’s a good thing I can’t see because I got my hair done this morning at thae mew place so I may have a mullet or worse and this way I have to wait a while to really get a good luook at it. I wrnte straight from the hair place to tthe eye doctor *where I saw this guy who looked just like Jake Gyllendhalla, but I’m blind now, so he could have looked like Willy Nelson, who knows). So I only got to look at my hair in th e regarview mirrow. I’ll play with it later. Well, I’m hgoing to go listen to some tv cfor a little while, I think Ellen is on. Please forevigne any speliing errors as again, I am bliingd.

Yours,

Shannooy

What’s New Pussycat?

So I have to share with you all one of my favorite pairs of flip flops this year. I have a ton, and some are conservative, but I saw these in the kids’ section at Old Navy and thanked the Lord for short feet. I have to say that these are the one pair of flip flops that elicit the most groans from my family: “Oh Lord she’s wearing the pink ones.” But they are just so cute and sport tiny little rhinestones! How could I pass them up?? I do have to pick the occasions when I wear them wisely though. Going out to brunch recently with the inlaws and Jon saw me eyeing my kitty shoes and said “Come on now, you might want to reel it in when it comes to your shoes if we still want them to take us out.” Ah well, that just means they get to be worn on special occasions!

But won’t I drown?

I’ve always wanted to be a bath person, but never really was until we bought this house. Our bathtubs have always been small and not so cozy. The tub at the last house was brown and who wants to float around in that? So I was really excited when we were house shopping. High on the list was a big bathtub. And we got it. A big ol white Jacuzzi tub. Jacuzzi name brand, but alas, no jets. Ah well, beggars can’t be choosers. I’m just happy our tubs big enough to actually stretch out in a bit.

I’ve embraced the bath culture full on. My Mom was over the other day and said she’s never known anyone in her entire life with as much product as I have. I’ve got bath milk, beads, oil, fizzies, bubble bath, confetti, body scrubs, candles, apres bath lotions and potions galore.

And I finally allowed myself what I consider to be a ridiculous indulgence- a bath pillow. I bought a cute silver number from Swell at Target tonight. I tried it out as soon as I got home and and loving it. My Mom’s a big fan of her bath pillow and was telling me how she’ll run a bath, climb in and just fall asleep. All I could think of was if I tried that I’d slip under the water and drown in my sleep. Mom said if anyone could do it, it would be me. So I’m happy to report I’m alive and well and completely relaxed from my bath.

Prime Rib at Prime TimeLast night we went to my sister’s house for dinner and to watch prime time Price is Right. Sara made a fabulous dinner and enjoyed the Koziol frog prince bottle opener I gave her as part of her mother’s day present. She’s doing a great job with Jake. He’s getting so big. Look at him- standing up watching Daddy and Uncle Jon grill the prime rib.

Outback in the Out Back

Last night Jon and I went to his parents’ house for dinner and some ripping out of carpet in their guest room. I didn’t rip out carpet, the boys did, just in case you were confused about my level of prissiness. Anyway, they live about a half hour or so from us and to get there we drive the back roads and cross the state line 4 times due to the little part of their state that juts down into ours. On the way home, it was about 11 pm, we are driving down this dark 2 lane country road and come upon a field. In which sat, fully inflated and lit up like Times Square, the Outback Steakhouse Blimp. Miles from any large city or event I might add. I’ve never seen a blimp so close before, or even on a back road in rural North Carolina. Even though it was raining you know we had to stop to get a picture.

Domestic Goes Digital

In case you haven’t heard, the lovely Miss Rachel and I are hosting an online Tupperware party through May 7. Now, that seems like a long way off since it’s still technically April, but it’s just around the corner. So get on the stick and make your list! You know you love it. Then email me and I’ll hook you up. Trust me, you should only be taking your famous devilled eggs to that cookout in this most fabulous famous devilled egg transporter.

And, here’s another domestic teaser for ya…keep an eye out for the online Pampered Chef party we’ll be hosting in a few weeks. Who knew we were such internet socialites?

Hair raising

Posting about my Mom and Mole Neck Lenny brought back a lot of hair related memories. My Mom went to cosmetology school when we were kids, or rather, her guinea pigs. Yes I was the only girl in 7th grade sporting a rat tail- and not at my request. Sara had a funky asymmetrical skater do that was pretty cool, and way beyond the sophistication level of most 6th graders in our small town. We had perms, trims that turned into major makeovers, the works.

My favorite Mom hair story though involves my old friend Leslie. She came over one night so Mom could highlight her long, thick, dark brown hair. Hair that had never been processed in any way. So it took a really long time to pull it all through the little cap, especially because we were all enjoying chatting and cocktails. Then Mom applied the chemicals and we waited for Leslie to process and chatted and snacked and had a couple more cocktails.

Then Leslie says something along the lines of “Is it supposed to be this hot? It burns.” We rush over and Mom pulls off the little plastic bonnet thing and looks at me with horror on her face- Leslie’s “honey colored” highlights were stark white. She looked like a skunk and the bride of Frankenstien’s daughter. Her hair was literally smoking! We pulled the cap off and Leslie went to wash her hair out- she had no idea what had happened. We kept telling her how great it looked! Very fashion forward. At this point it’s nearly midnight so we were trapped! Leslie took one look at herself and started crying. Mom got on the phone with 1800Clairol who weren’t much help, then made an emergency run to an all night drugstore.

Mom eventually fixed Leslie’s hair, but it never looked the same. Especially all the little broken pieces that literally burned off. I’m pretty sure this incident is what caused our friendship to go sour. Last I heard she moved to Maine. Thank goodness Mom’s not licensed there!

*Just to clear up some things…I was about 22 and Leslie was about 20 when we burned her hair off. My Mom did not let me have cocktails as a kid. I had to be certified legal before drinking in her house.