"Can I have your fat?"

I've been losing weight lately, and I haven't even been trying.  I think that all the working out at the gym with a trainer is finally paying off.  If I had to guess, I would say that I'm increasing my lean body mass enough that it is having a positive effect on my metabolism.  Finally!  I went to the gym this morning and I am getting very strong.  I was able to "skin the cat" on the hanging rings, and I was able to jump up to a pull-up position and hold it, while holding my legs out perpendicular to my body.  And I can do push-ups.  Regular push-ups.

I have come to accept the fact that I will have to continue with a pretty regimented work-out routine because when it comes to food, I am hopeless.  My aunt and I have discussed the fact that we have both asked the question, "Can I have your fat?" to people we have eaten dinner with who for some unfathomable reason don't like the fatty edge of pork chops or steak.  We decided that anyone who has uttered the phrase, "Can I have your fat?" better face the fact that they will always have to be super active if they don't want to balloon up.

Also I was reading some of my old blog posts and I came across a telling old gem.  I was writing about how I found the story in the song "The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald" disturbing, but not because they all died in a shipwreck, but because of their food situation:

The dawn came late and the breakfast had to wait
When the Gales of November came slashin'.

They had to wait for breakfast because of the terrifying storm.  Ugh, I hate waiting for breakfast, and then...

When suppertime came, the old cook came on deck sayin'.
Fellas, it's too rough to feed ya.
At Seven P.M. a main hatchway caved in, he said
Fellas, it's been good t'know ya

Well?  Did they eat lunch?  That cook is a real downer.  Like it's not bad enough to be in a cold, scary storm, but for the cook to refuse to feed you supper because of it?  Especially after not serving breakfast? That sucks!  And then at seven p.m., when the main hatchway caved in, I bet everyone was really depressed and scared (and hungry) and that old bastard rubbed it in by saying, "Fellas, it's been good t'know ya."  Way to think positive, Old Cook!

It's my birthday soon! (I think), I'll be 43! (I suspect) Updated with a new message from DAD!

It's that time of year again:  my birthday.  Today isn't actually my birthday but I am pretty sure it's happening sometime soon. I am not quite positive how old I am going to be either.  If you are new to the blog you are probably thinking, "Wow, this lady is really an idiot," and although that may be true, it is not my fault I don't know how old I am or when my real birthday is.

When I was a teenager I put together these facts: 1) My parents met in January of 1969.  2) They got married in June of 1969, a mere six months after they met.  3) My mother wore an empire waist wedding dress,

and 4) I was born in September...... of 1970, so they say.  I innocently questioned if their wedding was of the shotgun variety those many years ago and they both were defensive about it.  A bit overly defensive, if you ask me.  So I have long suspected that I am actually a year older than they tell me I am.

Two years ago around my birthday I asked again if I was born in 1969 or 1970 (I figure they will slip up and the truth will come out eventually), and this is what my dad told me in an email:

"Here's what I remember about your birthday. In September 1970-do the freaking math will you!........ (see? defensive. Too defensive??? You decide.) You were born in a Catholic hospital in St. Cloud with nuns in attendance. Mom was in labor for over 24 hours and she passed out between labor pains. At one point she told the cute little red-headed nurse she wanted to go home. The nurse looked at me and said, "Do you want to take her home Mr. Lindahl?" I didn't.  You finally popped out in your own good time and all was well except we missed some insurance deadline for coverage by an hour or two so the good old nuns changed the dates of your birth to get us the coverage we needed. You ended up costing us not much. Whew! You may have been born on the 30th of September but it was in 1970 NOT 1969. Sometimes you acted like a little bastard but you actually are not one. Happy birthday and legit or not, I love you! Dad"

I totally did not expect that I had the wrong day for the first 41 years of my life, but at least I was only one day off.   And then several days ago I got this:

I think my dad is gaslighting me.  Or my birthday is actually September 17.

My parents are coming to visit me this weekend and take me out for a nice birthday dinner.  I can't wait for this year's birthday bombshell.  What could it be this time?  I'm adopted?  I absorbed my identical twin in the womb?  I was born a boy?  Who knows?!

.....................................................................................................

UPDATE:  I just got this from my dad.  At this point I don't think he is trying to drive me nuts.  I think he is losing his marbles.  Time for the home!

Errrrr, BTW, I've been thinking lately and you may actually  be 45 on Sunday, not 44 or 43. Sorry, it's all just a little fuzzy about dates and all back then. You know college kids in those days. It was the 60's you know. Oh well, who really cares how old you actually are anyway. See you this weekend. Dad

It won't be so bad, Dad, you could maybe be the prom king! (that's an optimistic maybe)

Red Flags

I got a new job.  I told you last week about my dilemma with the job I accepted at the middle school, which is different than the middle school I worked at last year, but in the same district.  I was offered the position of teaching what I did last year with the addition of one class to get me up to full time.  I was a little nervous because I've heard terrible, TERRIBLE things about this particular school.  Apparently they had an awful principal for years and staff moral was as low as low can be.  But this year they got a new principal!  The school is in a gorgeous new building!  Things will be fine!  Right?

One of the first red flags was before I even went to the school.  I printed out the staff list.  It lists who works there, what they do, and their phone numbers.  About half the staff is for special needs students; like special education teachers, emotional and behavioral specialists, social workers, psychologists etc etc. Normally in any public school situation, at most 20% of the students have special needs. What is with this one?   Red flag.

Another red flag is when I went there the first few times.  I did not have a classroom, or even a desk, and I was not scheduled to teach the two classes I agreed to.  I was scheduled to teach four classes, one of which included a class teaching kids who have managed to get to middle school and are still functionally illiterate.
Some people are good at teaching that.  I am not.  I would never have agreed to teach that.

The class I had agreed to teach, Read 180, is a program that the district bought several years ago that cost tens of thousands of dollars.  It is highly researched, intense reading program that is proven to work at getting readers who are a little bit behind up to grade level.  The most important part of the program is that the classes are taught in two hour blocks because if someone needs to acquire and make up skills they didn't get before, it's going to take more time than one 50 minute class a day.  I was signed up to teach that, but because of scheduling conflicts, they cut it down to one period blocks, which totally dismantles the program and dooms it to fail.  They spent lots of time and money training me to do this program.  I know how it works and I know that it isn't going to work in one period blocks.

Aside from teaching remedial reading, and reading to non-readers, I was scheduled to teach one section of English for seventh grade, and one section of English for eighth grade.  These classes with "normal" kids are jam-packed.  Last year there were 40+ kids in one class on average.  That is overwhelming.  Can you imagine the amount of correcting?  Yikes.

Also, one day I stopped by the school to drop my stuff off and as I was between loads, I discovered that the building automatically locks down at 3:15.  Why?  I don't know.  But it's like a prison.  I had to have a custodian escort me in and up to my room, unlocking doors all along the way.  Why does a school need to be locked down like a maximum security prison?  Red flag.

In the midst of freaking out about all the red flags and feeling like a trapped animal, the college prep charter school called me again and asked if there was anything they could do to lure me away from the public school.  Yes.  Yes there was.  They offered me a little more money than they had previously.  I took their offer.  Now I will be teaching small classes of 9th and 10th graders.  I'll be teaching World Literature and English Fundamentals.  I also get to teach an elective of my own choosing, which will of course be The Biography in which we will begin the course by reading a biography of George Washington.  Duh.

I'm a little overwhelmed right now trying to figure out a new system, and meeting new people etc. etc. but I have not seen any glaring red flags as of yet.  

There are Hotdogs in the Fridge

Last night Mitch and I came home from a weekend at the lake and discovered that while we were gone Sam cleaned the house and did a bunch of chores because he was home alone.  The house was literally cleaner when I got home than it was when I left. " Now THAT's how to raise a child!  GOD I'm a fantastic parent!"  I thought smugly to myself.  After Sam told me that he put my clean laundry in my room and that the dishes in the dishwasher were clean, he went to bed.

I put in the movie Chasing Mavericks about a kid who wants to surf monster waves and gets a pseudo foster father to help him do it.  I was watching the movie, still feeling pretty satisfied about what an OUTSTANDING parent I am, when I saw that the kid in the movie had the world's shittiest mother.  The first time we see her in the movie she is drunk, sleeping a bender off, totally oblivious that her kid almost died in the ocean and got a ride home from a strange man in a VAN.  When the kid came home he tucked her in and she rolled over and said, "There's hotdogs in the fridge," and passed out again.  Then he poured her booze down the drain.  "Oh.  That's too bad," I thought.  "He's not as lucky as Sam."

And then later in the movie the kid, who is about the same age as Sam, was heading out the door and he said something about how he washed the laundry and the dishes, and his mom's uniform was pressed and on her bed.  "Hmm,"  I thought, "I'm having a feeling of deja vu.  Weird."  Then I thought back to before I left my baby for my weekend of leisure while he stayed here and worked and cleaned the house, I actually said the words, "There are hotdogs in the fridge!"

"Oh. My. God,"  I thought.  Is Sam so good because he has to be?  Am I the shitty mother from Chasing Mavericks?  Is Sam the parent in our relationship and I'm so shitty I never even realized it???  Memories started flooding back:
~The time when he was a toddler and we played with a tiny plastic Sammy and Mommy dolls and he always wanted to be Mommy:  at the time I thought it was because he loved me so much.  I now suspect he was modeling proper Mommy behavior for me.
~The time when he was about five and was telling me a story about my dad and said, "...and then Grandpa (you know, your dad) said I could...."  At the time I thought he was a good story teller, but now I suspect he thought I was an idiot because I couldn't put together that his grandpa is my dad.
~When he would always insist on holding my hand in the grocery store parking lot; at the time I thought it was because he loved me so much.  Now I think he was guiding me safely to the store.

My child has been raising me for his whole life and I never even realized it.  Holy shit.  What does this mean?
I think it means I should write a parenting book because HOLY SHIT, I AM AN AWESOME MOTHER!!! Have you SEEN how good my son is?  IN YOUR FACE!  (That will be the title of my parenting book - In Your Face! or maybe Holy Shit I am an Awesome Mother!  or maybe There are Hotdogs in the Fridge)  I'll have Sam start working on a first draft.

Now that we are all clear on who is doing the parenting and who is being parented in this house, I have some bones to pick with Sam about how Kira is turning out.

Summer Vacation!

I have been having a lot of fun lately, and I know when I tell you about it you are going to be jealous and then probably write me off and not pay any attention to me anymore, but I'm going to risk it.  You'll get over it.

On the 4th of July Mitch and the kids and I went out on Mitch's brother's Mat's boat to watch the fireworks. It was glorious!

The Coast Guard stopped us because the four kids and I were sitting on the bow.  The kids were all wearing life-jackets so they gave us five Dairy Queen coupons for "all the kids on the bow wearing life-jackets."  Hey!  They thought I was a kid!  And they also thought I was wearing a life jacket.  Time to lose some weight!

On the morning of the fourth, my friend Shelly and I went to the Duluth Rowing Club for a rowing lesson with our gym trainer, Jeff.  He is a rowing coach.  He took Shelly, another teacher named Jane, and me out on a four person boat.  It was so much fun!  The weather was perfect and the water was like glass.  Apparently over the last hundred years or so the boats used for the sport of rowing have been designed and improved and engineered to be perfect rowing machines, but that didn't stop us from giving Jeff suggestions on how the boat could be better.  You are supposed to cross your hands left over right in the middle of the stroke.  Shelly suggested that right over left would be better and I suggested that maybe they should just make the oars shorter so no crossing was necessary in the first place.  Jeff explained that the boat is designed to be perfectly balanced when the rowers put their left hand over their right hand, and that the oars needed to be the length they are for the optimal amount of leverage in the row.  We are still skeptical.  

He has a lot of patience.  

A few days later I went to see Brandi Carlile in concert.  She was FABULOUS!  She has so much talent packed into a tiny, adorable little package.  What a voice!  It was an outdoor concert along a river in Des Moines.  Gorgeous night!

A few days after that my sister Beth and Mitch and I went to the Richard Thompson/My Morning Jacket/Wilco/Bob Dylan concert here in Duluth.  It was a lot of fun.  My sister Amy was heading to Duluth that evening and said, "I'd really love to go to the concert with you guys if it wasn't Bob Dylan."  Apparently she's not a fan.  Amy and Beth went to a Dylan concert many years ago when they were teenagers and apparently he just stood in a dark corner and sang unintelligibly.  He was pretty good this time but he didn't say one word to the audience and at one point when he was singing Beth said, "I wish there were subtitles."

Later that night my sisters and I came back to my house and celebrated Amy being back from Afghanistan by eating Doritos and Top The Tater, drinking Miller Light, and learning how to twerk from instructional videos on the internet.  Oh, you don't know what twerking is?  It is the latest gross dance kids are doing to horrify their parents.  Basically you squat down and shake your undercarriage.

Beth got pretty good at it with some practice but Amy is hopeless.  Her twerk was mostly arms with not much going on below the waist.  We kept yelling, "Less arms!"  but that just made her shake her arms more.  I don't know why that happened because arms aren't even a small part of a good twerk.  When I do it I feel like I'm really moving, but apparently I'm just sort of standing still making pigeon movements with my head.  SEXY SEXY SEXY!  

Brief Jerky

It was our wedding anniversary over the weekend!  Mitch tells me that the fifteenth anniversary is the one where it is traditional to give beef jerky.  In fact, he sent me a link to a website that makes "brief jerky."

I understand the (gross) principle behind edible underwear, but I think it would be more practical to make it thong-like and made of fruit roll-up material or cotton candy.  Beef jerky is a little tough and salty.  You don't want to spend all your foreplay time chewing and drinking water to quench your unquenchable thirst.

Happy Anniversary to me! (and Mitch)

Buff

Last month my friend Shelly and I started going to classes with a personal trainer.  It is at a gym that specializes in training teams and elite athletes so naturally it's the obvious place for middle-aged mom-types.  Our trainer's name is Jeff and he's been hiding his true self behind a facade of niceness and smiles and friendliness but his inner Jillian Michaels comes out sometimes.  One day he told us to do waiter walks (you hold a gigantic weight with a straight arm above your head and walk) to the end of the gym and back three times.  Then he decided that it would be better to do it outside because it was nice out.  So he showed us a spot about twice as far from our starting point as the length of the gym.  Shelly and I did it two times instead of three times because the distance was so much further.  The other ladies did it three times and asked how we got done so fast.  We told them our thoughts about the difference in distance and Jeff blurted out, "Nobody told you to think about it, just do it!"  Then he smiled like he was joking.

This morning he was telling us these arm exercises he wanted us to do and Shelly said, "So we'll use about 5 pound weights?"  and Jeff said, "five pounds??? What, are we 'toning'?"  And I really wish I had a sarcasm font because the disgust he had in his voice when he said that was absolutely hilarious.  Shelly and I were flabbergasted.  We said, "Um... yes, we are toning, aren't we?"  And he laughed and said, "No you're not.  You're adding mass."  Oh Jeff, the only reason I'm in your class is because of all the "mass" I've packed on in the last year.

Another thing we had to do this morning was some work with the yoga ball.  If the object of the yoga ball work was to see how far we can make a yoga ball shoot out from under us while we fall on the ground in a heap, we would have been world class, but that wasn't the object.  First we had to squeeze it between our legs and then do leg lifts with the ball.

We didn't look like this.

For us this was mostly throwing a huge ball in our own faces over and over again and then chasing it when it rolled away.  Then we were supposed to do planks with our elbows on the ball for what seemed like hours at a time.  Jeff came over and told me I was doing it wrong.  He took my ball and said, "This is what you're doing," and he draped himself over the ball like he was sleeping.  (I wasn't doing that) He said, "This is easy, I could do this all day."  Then he showed me that I was supposed to be planked up like a board, with only my elbows touching the ball.  Way harder.

He really works the shoulders a lot and I have been having a hard time even lifting my arms lately.  I got a new sports bra the other day and the first time I wore it I thought I was going to have to call 911 for help getting it off.  I'd hate to have to quit training because I ripped both rotator cuffs in a sports bra injury.  

The Yips

I'm a little worried about myself, like any self-respecting hypochondriac always is. But this time, instead of thinking I have some rare cancer or previously-thought vanquished disease like trench foot, I think I am losing my mind.  The mind is a very important thing to a hypochondriac.  How am I supposed to worry about every little thing if I can't even remember what I'm supposed to be worried about? 

Here's why I think I'm losing it:  I forgot my debit card PIN number.  I have had the same card and the same number for five or six years. (I can't remember how long I've had the card. (OMG.))  I have used this card for almost every purchase I have made for years and the other day when I gave the card to Sam to buy some gas, I tried to remember the number to tell him and it wouldn't come to me.  I had to go in the gas station with him to make the purchase myself because I thought that once I was faced with the keypad the number would come to me.  It didn't.  Then I thought that I had just psyched myself out and I would remember it when I was not under pressure.  I didn't.  Then a few days later, I FORGOT THAT I FORGOT THE NUMBER and went to the grocery store and after everything was rung up, I had to punch in my code and I still didn't know it.  I tried several combinations and they were all wrong.  "Ho-ly SHIT!" I thought to myself.  I had to write a check for my groceries.  A CHECK.

Then on Monday I was supposed to go to the dentist.  I like my dentist, he's cute and he's nice to me.  I was kind of looking forward to it.  I had a 9:20 appointment.  The previous Friday the dental office called me to confirm the appointment.  And they texted me.  And it was on my calendar in my phone.  Monday morning I totally spaced it out and forgot to go.  At 9:30 the receptionist called me to see if I was on my way.  "My way to what?" I said.  "Um, your appointment," she said.  "Crap," I said. 

At this point I was feeling like maybe Mitch should start looking into nursing homes for me.  Early-onset Alzheimer's is tragic and I didn't want him to have to deal with it.  I told him that when I got really bad and couldn't remember my children or him, he should kill me.  He said, "Why wait?"  That's when I decided to fight it.  The first thing I would do is find out my damn PIN number so I can buy stuff.  I looked in my file cabinet and didn't find it.  Then I remembered that when I first got the card I wrote the PIN on the top right corner of the back of a check register.  Then I remembered where I put that particular check register and found the number!  That's a pretty amazing feat for someone with Alzheimer's!  I found the check register and recovered my number (which still isn't even vaguely familiar. Yikes.) and committed it to memory.  I still haven't tried to use it because I'm scared it won't work. 

What do you think?  Should I be worried?  Has this kind of memory lapse happened to any of you?

Candy

As any good middle school teacher will tell you, a bucket full of candy is a must have school supply.  Adolescents will do almost anything for a piece of candy.  They will do almost anything for the mere promise of candy.  I suspect that is why pervs use candy as a lure to getting kids in their teardrop-window vans.  It just never fails.

"Hey kid, you like Twizzlers?"

I usually get to school a couple hours before my first class to do my work because I refuse to bring anything home with me.  Yesterday I opened my candy drawer and ate candy while I worked.  Usually I'm not that crazy about the stuff I buy, but yesterday for some reason, it was really hitting the spot.  I'd eat a piece, throw the garbage away, work for a few minutes and eat another piece.

When my first class came in, the kid that sits right up next to my desk looked into the garbage and we had this conversation:

Kid: Mrs. Lindahl, do you have a class before this one?

Me: No, why?

Kid: Well, who ate all that candy then?

Me: I had a few pieces before you guys came in, so what?

Kid: A FEW PIECES?  There's like, a hundred wrappers in there!

Me:  There's not a hundred wrappers.

At this point other kids came up to look at the collection of empty wrappers.

Another kid: Hey! She has Twizzlers!

Different kid: Are there any left, Mrs. Lindahl? Can we have some?

Original kid: Did you eat breakfast this morning?

Me: Yes, there are some left, and yes I had breakfast, why?

Original kid: You did have breakfast?  Wow.

Me:  Hey, it's not that much candy!  I like candy too, ya know.

Original kid: Not that much?  There's enough wrappers in there to feed a village!

At this point my aide was curious also, so she came to look at the wrapper carnage.

Original kid: Mrs. P., you must have been in here helping her eat all that.

Mrs. P.: No, I wasn't invited to this Twizzler party.

Me:  I'm never sharing my candy with you guys again.

Original kid: That's because there's probably none left.

Me: You have detention.
 

A day in the life of a bad haircut

When you have been given a bad haircut every day is filled with unwanted, unwelcome stress that emphasizes how shallow you are for feeling this amount of stress over something as inconsequential as a hairdo.  Then you are stressed about how shallow you are.

First of all, there is no more waking up looking adorable and slightly tossled.  You wake up looking like someone spent the previous eight hours sliding your head through a mangle.  Also there is no wondering if you can go one more day without a hairwash because this is what you look like when you wake up.

So you take the shower you didn't want to take, and you put in extra conditioner to discourage your hair from getting any of its own ideas.  You want it as limp and lifeless as possible because the above picture is what your hair looks like with life and vigor now.

You get out of the shower and prepare yourself for spending a ridiculous amount of time on your hair when you'd normally spend about three minutes on it.  First you have to decide how much product to use.  Too much and you will have to rewash and start over, not enough and your hair will revert to the original "fat bird with teeny wings" style it had when you walked out of the "salon."

After about twenty minutes of hairstyling that only takes you from looking like a mental patient to looking like you cut your own hair with a dull knife (mentally outpatient), you are ready to face the day.  You have pasted down the teeny wings that want to flare, you have tamed the hair on your cowlick in such a way that you can only hope it won't silently stick up like a  flag in an hour, and you have fought the top part that only wants to be in the shape of a cone.  Time for work!

You go to work and even though you've had this horrible cut for several days now, people still look at you with wonder and pity like you just walked away from a terrible car accident.  Several people say, "You got a haircut!" to which you can only say, "Yes, I did.  Thank you?"  Your students say, "I liked your hair better before."  And you agree.  Then they say, "Then why did you get it cut?" to which you have no answer.

You stop in the bathroom for a mid-morning pee break and glance into the mirror to discover that your hair has somehow, without you even knowing it, transformed itself and now you look just like Dwight Schrute.

You wonder how long you've been walking around like that and wish that someone would have said something, but at the same time you're thankful nobody said anything.  You frantically fingercomb the hair back into some semblance of a purposeful hairdo and go back to work.

The day goes on and on with many more "You got a haircut!" comments and bathroom breaks to see how ridiculous you look.  Finally, you can go home and relax.  You stop worrying about your hair for awhile and just let it do what it needs to do.  When you go to the bathroom to brush your teeth before bed, this is what you see:

And you remember fondly the old days when your hair was glorious enough to earn you the name "Lord Farquad" by a couple of jealous sisters.  You think that the stylist must have had some style in mind that was so good it was worth not listening to a word you said and giving you this cut instead.  "I just haven't figured out how to fix it right," you tell yourself.  "Tomorrow I will figure it out."  Then you go to bed sure that it will grow quickly and soon you'll be the ugly duckling no more!  Then you wake up to another morning and it's like it's Groundhog Day all over again.

Be careful what you wish for...

Well don't you all just loooooooove the idea of me sending my sister who is in Afghanistan a picture of myself with the worst haircut ever given to anyone who has had haircuts.  I have spent most of the past four days trying my hardest to keep my head from looking like a fat bird, but last night I stopped the constant smoothing for a while and then took some pictures of myself for my sister and I SENT THEM TO HER.  Are you all happy now?  I did that for my own personal troop.  What are you doing for your troop?  Don't have a troop?  You can share mine.  She says she loves getting mail over there so send her something.  Some magazines, or some gum, or some cookies, some holiday decorations, or some pictures of YOU with a bad haircut.  Her address is:

LCDR Amy Lindahl

PRT URUZGAN

FOB Tarin Kowt

APO AE 09380

Send her something, Smarties. Now I know you are all dying to see my crazy awful bird hair so I am going to post it, but this is not for you, dear reader, this is also for my troop because nothing makes a sister happier than when another sister looks silly, right Amy?  Right, Beth?  Right sisters all over the world?  (And also because Amy has a blog and I wanted to scoop her on this hot story.)

There must be some magical under-cutting on the sides that I can't find because without constant management those wings want to fly.

Side view.  There is nothing in the back to support those wings.  And nothing on the top to hold them down.  Just fluffy feathers.

This is just for Amy and Beth.  A gross, lipless, multi-chinned oversmile.  You're welcome.

Decision 2012

This is a Facebook chat between my sister and me this morning:

Amy: I DO have a package to send you....since I didn't get you a b-day present....

Me: Is it a blue burka?

Amy: I got Sid and Mills some 'jewels' at the bazaar last weekend. And no, it's not a blue burka. You're NOT getting a blue burka. Those are creepy.

Me: But that's what I want!!! I got a horrific haircut on Saturday. I've never wished more for a blue burka.

Amy: I want to see a picture. And I'll see what I can do....there's certainly enough of them around here. Geez.

Me: No pictures. Just imagine a fluffy fat bird with teeny little wings. That's my hair.

Amy: HA HA! PICTURE!! Come on....your followers would LOVE it!!

Me: No. It's too horrible. That's why I need a burka.

Amy: NO you don't! What does Kira say about it?

Me: I would wear the burka and say it is in protest of the taliban, but really I'd just be waiting for my horrid haircut to grow out. Kira calls me "Sir."

Amy: HA HA HA HA HA!! I'm going to tell her to take a picture and send it to me....

Me: No.

Amy: Come on, that would be a GREAT Christmas present!! Framed, please.

Me: I will send you one of my school pictures.

Amy: No, I've already seen that.

Me: But it's a professional portrait!

Amy: Sarah, I'm in AFGHANISTAN. Don't you want to lift my spirits? I won't be able to Afghanistand it if you don't....

Me: Oh.... My .... God.... That was horrible.

So, should I throw vanity and self-respect to the wind and send her a picture of my horrific hairdo? Or do I say tough shit, I will not sacrifice my dignity for the cause of troop morale and just send her some gum instead? You, my readers, get to decide. Vote in the comments...

Person of Walmart

About a month ago I got my 150,000,000th bad haircut.  Like many in the past, it was almost right, but not quite.  I had to come home and hack off a couple pieces to make it better which seems so stupid, but it simply has to be done.  Of course, I didn't do a very good job because it's hard to cut the hair on the back of your own head.

So today while I was out and about, I thought I'd stop in somewhere and just get the back part shaped up a little.  I got in right away and told the cute girl that I just wanted the back fixed where I cut it because it wasn't very neat.  We talked for a long time about what I am looking for in a haircut and I thought she got me.  I told her I liked the sides and top, but the bottom of the back needed to be fixed.  She took my glasses and assured me that she was doing what I was asking.  It even felt like she was doing what I was asking.  I'm no stranger to cutting my own hair so I knew what I wanted, I just needed someone to do it that could actually see what they are doing.

Like the optimist I am, while she was cutting I thought maybe she was the one.  The girl who would be my haircutter for the rest of my life.  The girl who I would be so loyal to that when she got promoted to a super-fancy salon that charges 80 dollars a cut, I'd still go to her because it would be worth it.  She seemed so happy with her work, and genuinely excited about what a good job she'd done and how good I looked that I was excited too when she turned me toward the mirror and handed me my glasses.

I looked in the mirror and could hardly keep from crying.  It is the worst haircut I have ever gotten, IN MY LIFE.  Yes, worse than the crop-topped poodle cut I got in seventh grade when I asked to look like Stephanie Powers.  Worse than all the cut-THEN-perms I stupidly got.  Worse than all of it put together.  I am at a loss for what to do about it because there is no way in hell I'm going in to have someone else cut MORE and try to fix it.  And I don't even know where I would start if I try to fix it myself.

How to describe it... hmmm.  It's like she heard that I didn't want the sides touched, but then totally stopped hearing me so she gave me a supershort "mom-cut" but left the long sides.  Like a Hasidic Jew.

Like this. (NOT the woman)

It's like I have three different ugly haircuts all morphed together onto one head.  It's horrifying.  It's a pixie cut with long chunks on the sides.  When will I meet her, the one who will get that I don't want to look like Velma or Peggy Hill or an Orthodox Rabbi?  The one who will laugh with me about all the shitty haircuts I've ever gotten and will never give me a bad haircut again in my life?  I found a husband.  I even found a dentist, but still the hair stylist eludes me.

When I was in the car on the way home I called Mitch and told him how upset I was because of this, sort of giving him a heads up so he wouldn't laugh at me as soon as he saw me or say something like, "What the hell have you done?"  He was appropriately sympathetic until he said, "Where did you get it?" and I said, "Walmart."  Then he laughed and laughed and said, "What did you expect?!"  I guess now we know where the "People of Walmart" get their hair done.  Honestly, I only wanted two or three quick snips to fix the back and since I was there anyway to pick up a prescription, I thought Walmart could handle that.  Nope.  I am now, and for the next several months until this can grow out, a Person of Walmart.

This lady has better hair than me.  

My Hot Hot Body

Like everyone past a certain age (40) I am not a perfect physical specimen.  I have my little health issues, but I usually don't talk about them too much (shut up, Mitch!) because although my problems aren't frightening or deadly, they tend to not be glamorous maladies like amnesia or elephantitis (shut up, Beth!).  One of my problems is that I have to wear a CPAP mask to bed because I have sleep apnea.  I've had it since I was a little kid.  My doctor says I have "dainty respiratory passages."  (And that's why she's my doctor.)  The reason I don't tell people about the CPAP machine too often is because I get into conversations that I think are genuinely supposed to make me feel like I'm being commiserated with but are just humbling.  Kind of like this:

Me: I wear a CPAP mask to bed.
Other Person:  Really!  My uncle has one of those.
Me: Oh?
Other Person: Yes.  He's morbidly obese.
Me: Oh.
Other Person:  He lives in the nursing home now because he couldn't wash himself.
Me: ....Oh.
Other Person: He had to be taken out of his house with a fork lift.
Me:...
Other Person: Because he's so fat, not because of the CPAP.
Me: Okay.
Other Person:...
Me:...
Other Person: They had to use a chainsaw to remove a wall to get the fork lift in there.
Me:  Alright.
Other Person: But he's doing great now!
Me: Well.  Good, I guess.
Other Person: The only thing he's mad about is that they don't let him eat his favorite breakfast anymore.
Bacon and egg yellows.
Me:  I gotta go.

Or when I recently had vertigo and had to explain myself to other people.

Me: Sorry I couldn't make it.  I had a bad case of vertigo.
Other Person: Oh! That's terrible!  I'm so sorry!  My great great grandma has that.
Me:  Your great great grandma is still alive?
Other Person: Barely.
Me:...
Other Person: Anyway, she has a walker because her balance is so bad.
Me:...
Other Person:  It's a really nice walker. It has a seat on it.
Me:  ...
Other Person:  And a basket.
Me:...
Other Person:  Want me to ask where she got it?
Me:  I gotta go.

First World Problems UPDATED!

Some unpleasant things are going on around here.  Firstly, I'm not what I would call sick, but I feel like something crawled into my digestive system somewhere and died.  Maybe a squirrel. It feels like there is a huge ball of raw over-kneaded pizza dough in my stomach and it won't go away, it just rolls around all day.  You can imagine the effects of having a undigested tudball of dough/dead squirrel stuck somewhere in your intestines. It's not good.  Also, the corners of my mouth are chapped and irritated so I look like I just took off clown make-up all the time.  I'm disgusting right now.

The other unpleasant thing is that apparently my upstairs bathroom is the central destination for all the flies in the world.  There were hundreds of flies buzzing around the window yesterday, and many more hundreds of teeny fruit flies that hang out on the mirror.  I took the vacuum in there and took care of business, and then cleaned the place until it smelled like a hospital thinking that would take care of the problem, but the flies are back today.  Why is this happening?  There are no carcasses in there for flies to breed on, and there is no rotting fruit for the fruit flies so I really don't understand the attraction to this particular destination.  There is only one possible explanation:
My upstairs bathroom is possessed by the devil.

Remember in Amityville Horror when the priest was killed by the millions of flies in the upstairs?  I have the same thing except they haven't killed anyone, yet.  One of these days I'm going to be sitting on the pot, trying to dislodge the squirrel, and I'm going to hear "GET OUT" in a devil voice, I just know it.  At least if that happens the squirrel will probably come shooting out, no problem.

But then that makes me think that maybe the two problems are related.  I mean, it seems like a ridiculous coincidence that I could have dry-rot in my innards and a demon-possessed bathroom at the same time. That's just stupid.  Maybe the flies are coming from inside my body and I am the one possessed by the devil.  Holy crap.  It's not a dead squirrel inside of me, it's Lucifer.  If that is in fact what is going on, I have to say that the little girl in the Exorcist was kind of a drama queen.  It's not all that bad.  In fact, if it wasn't for the flies, I wouldn't even bother bringing it up.

UPDATE:  Anonymous wrote me a helpful comment about how to solve my problems.  She told me to take a probiotic for the dead squirrel, and to set up a fruit fly trap.  I got a jar and filled it with some fruit (didn't have apple vinegar) and put in a paper funnel.  I am catching fruit flies.  Then I thought, "Huh, anonymous really knows her stuff!" so I looked up probiotic on Wikipedia because I didn't know what it was.  Is it a pill?  Yogurt?  And I found this:

Probiotics are also delivered in fecal transplants, in which stool from a healthy donor is delivered like a suppository to an infected patient.^[2]

Oh. My. God.
I would rather be possessed by a dead-devil-squirrel-demon than have a fecal transplant.

Hot hot hot!

Things overheard in my bedroom last weekend:

“You have to line the holes up or it won't fit straight.”

“What do you think, upper holes or lower holes?”

“I'm not ready! Don't push yet!”

“You want me to pound that in for you?”

“Maybe don't screw that in all the way yet.”

“Ha, I finished before you AGAIN!”

“Okay, let's do this again.  WAIT Wrong hole! Wrong hole! Back up!”

“Oh, I don't know, I think this is going to be TOO HOT.”

“This is IMPOSSIBLE to get in.”

“Just fold it over your thumb and shove it in.”

All this because I went to IKEA and got a brand new bed!  Ta da!

I wasn't going to buy anything but then I saw the duvet cover and I LOVED it.  But I didn't have a duvet, so I had to get a duvet.  Then since I knew I had to go through the cash registers anyway, I went a little nuts.  I got a bunch of other stuff and then I thought to myself, "Self, why not get a bed frame as long as you're going to pack your car up to the gills anyway," so I got the bedframe too.  Then I came home and Mitch and I assembled our bed and stuffed the new duvet into the duvet cover, hence the dialog at the top.  The duvet is nuclear hot but I'm so determined to use it that we sleep with the window open.  

Hey Sarah, what stinks?

It's me.  I'm the one who stinks.  I don't think we realize how important smells are until our lives are ruined by a bad one.  A few years ago sewer gas seeped into our house for a few days and I can't even tell you how many hundreds of times I considered burning the whole place down.  And now I can honestly say that since my dog got sprayed THREE times in a ROW in the FACE by a skunk last week, I love her less.

I love her less because I can barely tolerate the stench I think will probably follow her (and me) around for the rest of her life.  I love her less because she was stupid enough to get sprayed three times, not that it would make that much of a difference smell-wise if she only got sprayed once, but how dumb was that?  If a skunk sprayed you in the face, would you keep chasing it?  I thought border collies were supposed to be smart.  Not this one.  I love her less because she didn't have the decency to wait until the skunk left the deck before she harassed it, so the first time it sprayed her it also sprayed the house, the deck furniture, and the door.  I don't think she thought the whole thing out very well.   SO inconsiderate.

If it was summer I would shave her bald to get rid of the offending fur that is carrying the stench, but no, it's fall so I suppose it would be considered animal cruelty to shave her naked right before winter.  Also, one time I cut her hair short and she looked ridiculous and slinked around in utter embarrassment for about six months while it grew out.  She's very vain so I bet this whole debacle is pretty bad for her too.  I cut off the worst of the hair, around her mane, and she looks pretty silly.

Since I had the scissors out there cutting grossness off of her, I also cut her butt hair because in another example of how stupid the theory of intelligent design is, the hair right around her anus grows longer than any hair on her whole body.  I don't think I have to tell you why that is gross.  Now she looks like she has a radical bob haircut on her butt.  I kind of like the way it looks, but judging by the way she tucks her tail between her legs everywhere she goes, she does not like it.  She would NOT let me take a picture of her back end.  Every time I got her to stand and then pointed the camera at her she would sit.  See?  She seems pretty smart!  But she's not.

Just so she wouldn't feel so alone I also got a bad haircut.  My sister sent me a great picture of my dad yesterday and my hair looks just like his in that picture.

Of course, he is in his sixties and is working outside in the rain so the style is understandable on him.  On me it just looks weird.  So now both Maisy and I smell bad and look weird.  For a while.  Someday the stench will fade, and the hair will grow out, and we will be back to our old sweet-smelling, gorgeous selves.  But probably not for about a year.  

It's almost my birthday (I think)

It's almost my birthday.  Well, I think it is anyway.  In the past few years there has been some question of when my birthday actually is, and how old I actually am.  My parents have secrets.  My parents tell me they met in January of 1969, had a whirlwind romance (gross), and got married in June because they couldn't stand to be apart.  Then, as their story goes; in the fall of 1970, a full fifteen months after they got married, I was born.  When I was a teenager I thought about the story a little more carefully.  They met in January and got married in June....hmmmm.  That's weird.  Who gets married to someone they've only known for five months?  Then I looked more closely at my mother's wedding dress.  Empire waist.  Hmm...

Interesting choice.  Sure, it was in fashion in 1969, wasn't it?  But still.  See where I'm going with this?  I suspect I was born in September of 1969 and not September of 1970.  I could never get my parents to admit it though.  In fact, whenever I bring it up (every year) they get a little impatient with me and tell me, "You were born in 1970, NOW DROP IT."  Somebody doth protest too much, Mom and Dad.

The other birthday bombshell is that September 29 is not my real birthday.  September 30 is.  I learned that last year in an email from my dad:

"Here's what I remember about your birthday. In September 1970-do the freaking math will you!........ You were born in a Catholic hospital in St. Cloud with nuns in attendance. Mom was in labor for over 24 hours and she passed out between labor pains. At one point she told the cute little red-headed nurse she wanted to go home. The nurse looked at me and said, "Do you want to take her home Mr. Lindahl?" I didn't.  You finally popped out in your own good time and all was well except we missed some insurance deadline for coverage by an hour or two so the good old nuns changed the dates of your birth to get us the coverage we needed. You ended up costing us not much. Whew! You may have been born on the 30th of September but it was in 1970 NOT 1969. Sometimes you acted like a little bastard but you actually are not one. Happy birthday and legit or not, I love you! Dad"

Notice the defensiveness about the birth year?  Interesting.  Oh, and of course I didn't know until I turned 41 (42) when my birthday really was.  They kept that secret for over forty years.  That just makes me wonder what else I don't know about these mysterious people I call my parents.  What else are they hiding???

I Might Be Really Sick

Something is happening to me and I don't like it.  My skin is raw and tender and dry, and my tongue is so tender and chapped that I could barely eat the chili cheese Fritos I had with my lunch.  Barely.  I'm actually kind of regretting the Fritos because I don't think they were worth all this pain.  Mitch says that it sounds like an allergy and I said, "But what in the world could I be allergic to???" and he suggested it's the neighbor's dog that I have stolen made friends with.

I let her in our house every night to sit on my lap and watch TV (we like the same shows).  Mitch isn't crazy about it because he is afraid we are going to get busted by the neighbors and he's sure that she will just happen to be on Mitch's lap when the angry neighbor looks in the glass door and sees his dog with her new family.  I don't think I'm allergic to her.  I'm not allergic to dogs, Mitch, I mean, "DOCTOR."  And my tongue is the most affected part of my body and I don't lick the dog.  You'd think if I was allergic to her I would have itchy hands or an itchy lap, but I don't, Dr. Oz; I don't.

If I was going to self-diagnose (which I always do) I would guess that I probably have the beginning stages of leprosy or scurvy.  Or maybe Vitamin D poisoning.  Mitch, are you lacing my food with extra Vitamin D???  My plan for dealing with this problem is to do nothing different and escalate the whining and complaining.  

Boot Dance

I'm finally NOT overwhelmed at work so hopefully I can be a better blogger.  So far, two weeks in, I am loving the job.  I don't know if you know this about me, but I'm a pretty good teacher.  The hardest part of the job is acting like an adult and being professional around the other adults.  Seriously, that is really hard for me.  I wore some new boots to work the other day and someone complimented me on them and I had to stop myself from doing a tap dance in them.  Specifically the move where you twirl your arms like windmills while your legs are doing jumping jacks.

inappropriate

That was my first instinct.  Something like that happens every second of every day I'm around a coworker.  Now you understand why I have been avoiding the work-a-day world for so long.

The kids are a lot of fun.  They openly enjoy a good boot dance.  They are just now learning how to run their locker combinations.  I told them they will dream of forgetting their locker combination for the rest of their lives.  One girl was coming to class late all the time with a huge pile of books and I found out she had given up on her locker and just decided to carry everything with her all day long for the next three years.  I've been making her practice opening her locker and now she can do it like an old pro.  Yesterday the kids really buttered me up by telling me that I look like I'm 37 and feigned shock when I told them I'm almost 42.  (Who says they don't have social skills!) They said that I look good in yellow, and that they like my fingernails.  One kid asked me if I dyed my hair.  I told him if I didn't, it would be mostly gray.  He said, "You can't even tell you dye it."  Which was weird, because how did he know to ask me if I dye it in the first place if it looks totally natural?