Moving is not my forte. Well, I suppose that moving is NO ONE’s forte, but there are people who move for a living, so perhaps they enjoy their job. I can’t be sure. So I’ll go with “most people hate to move.” I, myself, as previously stated, am one of those people.

It’s not the packing or unpacking, it’s the goodbyes that go along with it. While moving from a house to an apartment wasn’t quite the same sort of job that required actual movers or anything, it was still hard to say goodbye to the home I’d been lovingly restoring for years. I never expected to leave.

I’d begun moving on Wednesday, the day after the Comcast debacle began, which, I’m beginning to doubt that Comcast actually DOES care, or they wouldn’t have made me waste approximately two days to get Internet, but that, my wonderful Pranksters, is neither here nor there. (but it does make an excellent story for another day)

Box after box, I loaded into the van, pretending to be an overly large ant simply bringing offerings to the queen. It helps if I can visualize something like that or I get annoyed at the bruises that now make it appear as though I’ve been thoroughly beaten with whips and chains or boxes I happened to fill just this side of too heavy.

Three trips later, we were nearly done transporting boxes from this place to my new home, all over but the furniture and a couple of boxes that could only be packed at the last minute because they contained items like, “Marshmallow Fluff” and “Socks.” I mean, a day without socks is a day not worth living, and I wasn’t stupid enough to wear flimsy flippity-flops to move in, although that does seem to be something I’d do. Four inch heals? Sure! Let’s go run a marathon! Imma beat you motherfuckers! Just as soon as I fix this broken heel and nurse the 27 blisters on my feet that I got already. Wait, it’s ONLY been two minutes? That’s bullshit. 

It was weird, seeing my life packed up like that. I’d always thought that I had more stuff, but it turns out that my ritual purging had truly paid off. And not just because I’d already managed to dump my shit at the scary Salvation Army donations center, but because my life in boxes? Turns out, that well before this debacle began, I’d purged just the right amount of stuff to fit into my one-bedroom apartment. In fact, the only things I really needed to make my house a home were pieces of (cheap) furniture.

Target, you are my BFF forever and ever and ever. Except for the Pranksters who are my family.

Saturday, I brought my Muppet girlchild with me to the U-haul place nearby to pick up one of those truck thingies and managed to fill it – in one trip – with the furniture I could call my own, which means that I’ve been able to actually sit somewhere that is not the floor while I sort through my crap.

Slowly, I’ve been unpacking, cleaning, and placing things in my very own space. Because the space is smaller than the home I once lived in, it’s been much easier to utilize the space that I do have, paring down the items I own further, and making my apartment my home.

While leaving my home of 7 years has been incredibly hard, for the first time in my life, everything seems simpler.

More put together.

Calmer. More organized.

And happier.

Much, much happier.

“Hey,” I said over Instant Messenger. “Guess what?”

“What?” he replied, (justifiable) trepidation evident.

“I need your help this week,” I replied.

“With… what?” he asked, looking for clarity. When I need “help” with something, it can be anything from getting my whites whiter or building a shrine to BILLY FUCKING MAYS in my (former) backyard, and he knows it.

“Um, stuff,” I replied, aiming to be as vague as possible so that I could get a “sure, no problem,” without having to answer second-level questions.

“Like…?” He replied, apparently knowing me too well.

“Building stuffs,” I dangled in front of him like a carrot. I know him well enough to know that building shit = happy pants, while I’d just as soon cut off my toes and make a necklace of toe bones to wear than put stuff together.

“Ooooh! I like building stuffs!” He said, happily.

“I know! That’s why you’re perfect for this,” I said.

A couple of hours later, he showed up at my house, knocking before entering. I answered the door, kids piling over each other like a barrel of puppies, each trying to get him to greet them first. He swept them up into his arms and kissed them hello. “Hi Babies,” he said, brushing hair from Mimi’s face so she could see. She still stubbornly refuses to wear clips in her curls, which can make things like “walking” and “seeing stuff,” a little challenging for her.

I stood there, biding my time, waiting for him to be done with the children. Or, I should say, the children to be done with HIM.

“HEY,” I said, as he disentangled children from his frame, which they’d climbed like a couple of monkeys (without, thankfully, throwing poo)(THAT TIME). “Got something to show you. Meet me out front.”

With that, I walked into the garage and flipped the switch, opening the garage door which protested wheezily, but obliged. I walked out into the sea of boxes and held my hands out all jazz-hands meets spirit-fingers style.

“TA-DA!” I nearly shouted, trilling the last bit, relishing one of the last times I could be loud without the worry of irritating one of my neighbors in my new apartment.

“Woah,” he said.

I beamed.

“Where’s the stuff to build?” he asked.

“Um, somewhere in there,” I gestured to the pile of boxes I’d packed, wondering how I’d manage to pack a life into so few boxes.

A smile played mildly on the corner of his lips.

“You just conned me,” he pointed out.

“Yup,” I said, proudly. “Now let’s get moving.”

He stood there, shaking his head, amused, before grabbing a box and playing crap Tetris in the back of my van.

“Thanks,” I said honestly as we drove to my new place. “Thank you.”

And thus began the next chapter.

————-

Oh, and I wrote cool shit here.

…go sleep on the couch, Mommy.

I’ve never been a big proponent of the family bed.

Before you get all THINK OF THE CHILDREN, don’t mistake my meaning: It’s not that I don’t love my babies or anything, it’s that I like my sleep more. And adding two babies to my bed means that I spend half the night being kicked in the kidneys by a toddler who prefers to sleep horizontally because sleeping vertically is, apparently, full of the lame. I’d thought we’d gotten past the whole “kicking my internal organs” thing once I popped her out of my body, but I was wrong.

Adding to my bed another child – Alex – who’s five, means that he worms his way across his sleeping sister so that he can poke my eyeballs and stick his fingers up my sleeping nose, giggling uproariously until he’s sleepy enough to drift back into the land of nod.

By the time the sun peeks through the bedroom window, I’m staring glassy-eyed at the fug green of my walls and wondering how the sun got to be so damn bright at 7AM. Shouldn’t there be a law against that? I feel like their should be. Maybe I should sue the sun.

I’m starting to feel like it might be time to start shopping for kids bunk beds. Not for me, because, as someone who once broke a toe making a sandwich THAT WASN’T EVEN FOR ME, I’m about as able to sleep on a top bunk without breaking something as I am to eat a jar of mayo. I’ll do a lot for a bet, but that doesn’t come close.

Part of the reason I’d dig a bunk bed for the Littles is because, as the last born with a sibling ten years my senior, I’d always thought the idea of having a special cozy bunk bed would be full of the awesome. I mean – a bed. With a sibling on top of me. The thought of that makes me nostalgic for my childhood, in the same way a Bob Seger song does – nostalgia without a hint of experience.

See? You listen to that and you’re all, OMG HE KNOWS WHAT IT’S LIKE TO BE A MUSICIAN JUST LIKE ME – I’M A MUSICIAN ON TOUR, TOO. Until you realize you can’t even play the triangle without a stunt double.

I’m probably wrong. I have to imagine that if I did, in fact, manage to get a bunk bed for the Littles, they’d still want to

a) Sleep in my bed

2) Have ME sleep in their bunk bed with them, a situation that would NOT work out well.

So for the time being, I’m going to guess that I’ll just “wake up” each morning with a couple of kids poking me and sticking their fingers in my mouth, laughing uproariously.

I won’t lie. I like seeing the tiny Muppets curled up in my bed. My kidneys, though, they tell another story.

————–

Do you do the family bed thing, Pranksters? Have you used bunk beds before? Where are my pants?

…ation

No, not the Carly-Simon-song-turned-Ketchup-Commercial, although I guess I could get a bottle of ketchup out and try to make it drip onto my non-existent cheeseburger.

After a long battle with move-in dates, packing, and other various and sundries, I woke up this morning, stomach churning with anticipation, rolled out of bed, and pulled on one of the two shirts I had yet to pack. I considered wearing my prom dress, but decided the apartment people would think I was nuttier than normal. Which, not the impression I need to make. NOT YET, at least.

On the drive, Mötley Crüe came on and was crooning about home sweet home, which I took as a good omen.

I walked into the apartment complex, nerves finally settled, and prepared to sign yet another lease, hoping, at the very least, that this would be the final lease I had to sign for a year. I’d stuffed a few things in the back of the car on the off-chance I’d be getting my keys today, figuring that wouldn’t really work out so well, considering the way things have been going, which I should specify as “not bad,” simply, “not easy,” which is why I want one of those THAT WAS EASY buttons. But for real, not just something that SAYS it.

But whatever. No one said this shit was easy.

PROBABLY.

Tentatively, I asked the apartment complex if’n I’d be able to pick up my keys as I signed my year away, figuring they’d ask me to come back tomorrow or Friday or some other inconvenient time.

Nope.

After I packed up a bunch of papers with my new address, she returned and handed me these:

Pranksters. I finally did it. I have my own place.

I have no words for how this feels.

1) Christian Slater never ages. Luckily, through the use of Photoshop, neither do I!*

2) Starring in non-corny 80’s cult classics ensures that people like me cut their proverbial teeth on phrases like, “Talk Hard,” and “Chaos was what killed the dinosaurs, darling.”

3) If I were Christian Slater, it wouldn’t be creepy to have a crush on myself.

4) I could try and board a commercial airline with a gun in my bag and not have it be “potential terrorist,” but “quirky.”

5) I could be a vampire who DOES NOT SPARKLE. VAMPIRES DO NOT SPARKLE.

6) I could’ve been BFF with River Phoenix, my first television boyfriend from ages 6-13.

7) I could claim to have a “baboon heart,” and then die in the arms of my longtime love. Mostly, I just want to claim that I have a baboon heart, although I might call it “bonobo,” because it sounds cooler.

8) I’d much prefer to have “distinctive eyebrows,” than a “distinctively (dimply) ass.”

9) My sneering voice would allow you to impersonate Jack Nicholson over the phone, which increases not just my ability to get on radio shows, but also my credit line, as he’s got platinum EVERYTHING.

10) I could get Nerd Cred with a cameo role in Star Trek VI – which would mean that all nerds would listen to me. Forever (and we all know how much I heart nerds).

*A lie – I don’t own Photoshop. BUT I COULD. MAYBE.

I’d been blogging a couple of years before I’d decided to branch out on my own and start Mommy Wants Vodka. I’d spent years carefully (read: badly) coding in the text, well before WordPress rolled out TinyMCE as a feature. My former co-blogger was an actual editor, the kind who got paid to read absurd submissions, so she had lots of time to fix up my terrible typos, misspellings and grammatical inconsistencies into something that resembled a story.

(Damn, I miss her.)

The audience on my previous blog knew me – perhaps not well – but well enough to have hung with me a few times over the years, which meant I was expected to produce material about a) my vagina b) my vagina or c) dick jokes. That’s what happens when you write yourself into a niche.

After Alex was born, things changed. I wanted to write about the way he’d not allow me to put him down – even for a moment – without launching into a full-blown meltdown. About how tired I was. How lonely things had gotten with a husband who worked 80 hours on a good week, while my friends, waiting to have kids, climbed their career ladders. I had cracked nipples and they had 401K’s.

So I wrote it out. I wrote hard.

I wrote whatever was on my mind at the moment I opened up the blank WordPress screen, never expecting that other people would read it.

I tried to imagine someone – one person – out their reading my now-completely jumbled words, riddled with the sort of grammatical errors that make an English want to use red pen on their computer screen. Someone besides lovely “people” trying to sell me Viagra or increase the size of my member. Right kind of them, thinking of my member that way. I never could quite imagine that. An audience? Me. Nah. I’m a crappy writer. A scientist. Not a writer. Never a writer.

I didn’t expect an audience. And quite frankly? I didn’t so much care. I wrote because I wanted to, not because I expected to become rich, famous, or fancy – being “Internet Famous” is like being the coolest kid at the nerd table.

(I heart nerds)

Blog posts are a snapshot of a moment captured in words – good or bad, depending upon the reader and the writer – and if I’d captured every moment, I’d never have had the time to raise my kids. Or pee, for that instance… Although a poem about peeing with a cranky infant strapped to my nipple could’ve been awesome.

In fact, if I’d written everything down that first year, it’d have been: “OMG WHAT AM I DOING, I CAN’T SEE STRAIGHT, WALKING INTO WALLS, BLAHHHH, SO SLEEPY, SLEEPY SLEEPY SLEEPY SLEEEEEPY. Where’s my coffee?”

Instead I took those moments, twisted them into something better, and went with it. Sometimes, I was happy with what I’d written, other times, I knew it was a glistening pile of dogshit, but I didn’t care. There were no “metrics,” no “monetization,” no “Facebook likes,” to judge the words I’d put in order on the screen as “worthy” or “unworthy.”

I miss those days.

Since I began this silly blog, I’ve hurt people. I’ve ruined friendships and I’ve ruined relationships. You might say they’d been ruined (or on the verge of) already – which would be true – but through no honest ill-will on my end, it’s forced those relationships into the outbox.

I’m sorry for that. Genuinely. I’d never wanted to hurt anyone.

Once I opened up about my divorce to you guys – a situation that had been building for so long, something I’d kept quiet for well over a year, things got real for me. My life turned upside down, shit rained down like that pink goo in Ghostbusters II (except in Chicago). It wasn’t pretty. And? I didn’t even get to see Slimer OR the Stay Puft Marshmallow Man, those wily bastards.

I’d say that I was sorry for sharing my struggles with you, for being vulnerable, for asking for help when I needed it, except that I’m not.

Because for all the gossip and idle chatter; for all of the people who decided to pick sides and point their fingers, looking for someone to blame (divorce, like marriage, takes two to tango), I found a few people found comfort in my words. They understood what I meant, were in the middle of similar situations, or offered the one thing I’d needed: love.

And that’s all I need to remind me to keep going. To write hard. To ignore the naysayers inside my head and out. Because it all matters. And I can’t quit in a whiny pile of goo just because shit got real – I won’t.

If you’re out there, reading these words I’ve hastily strung together to form lackluster sentences, know that you’ve touched my life. It’s because of you that I’m still standing, walking around upright, and not huddled in a corner, weeping. MOST OF THE TIME.

No amount of comments,; no amount of subscribers, Twitter followers, Facebook likes can hold a candle to that.

Or this.

It all – all of it – matters.

Welcome to Shit I Found Saturdays, Pranksters!

Every week, I try to find some awesome shit around the ‘net to show you because, well, I feel sorta guilty for the whole “whinging about my divorce” crap.

Everyone needs a good laugh now and again.

This week, I’m dedicating my Saturday to the wonderful people of Band Back Together who have supported me, picked me up, dusted me off, and made me whole again; reminding me that truly, none of us are alone.

Even me.

Shit That’s Awesome:

I won an award. No, scratch that. I didn’t win this alone. My wonderful team of volunteers, our brave groups of writers and supporters, we won this award. To any of you who’ve read, lurked, commented, volunteered, written, or supported Band Back Together, we won this.

I sincerely hope that each of you reading these words know that you’re always welcome to write your stories of darkness and light, to drag your skeletons from the closet, and remind ourselves of one simple fact:

We are none of us alone: we are all connected.

Everyone has a story. Please tell us yours.

Shit I Read:

Kids Are Fucking Petri Dishes

Just A Fever (bring tissues)

Shit I Wrote:

Shit about saving cash and shit.

Amelia Has A Temper. SURPRISE TO NO ONE.

Shit I Did:

Posed In A Calendar

Ordered one of these (free!)




Here’s hoping it’s not fug.

Shit That’s Hilarious:

Whoops!

via Perez Hilton

Shit I Listened To:

————-

 How was YOUR week, Pranksters?

Because, I’ll be honest, until this afternoon, mine has been awful. Just a hard week.

Next week, though, will be better.

...by my bitch Kathryn

I’d probably change a few of these. IF I KNEW HOW.

————-

I’m off at a field trip today (no seriously, I do that shit sometimes. I know, what the nuts?). I should say this instead: I’m PROBABLY, if no one dies of bubonic plague or some shit, off to play with farm animals with my middle son. At least, that’s what I’m doing if I can figure out when and where this thing is going on. I think that parenting map needs to say something on the Chicago area that says something like, “Probably on a Field Trip or Dying of the Lurgy,” because hey, that’s what I do.

And as a thank you for putting up with my ass, Pranksters, but I’ve got a stellar giveaway going on tomorrow. Why? WHY NOT?

Also – who wants to meet me in VEGAS, baby? Because OMG I need a vacation – from LIFE.

We SO need to do this – Prankster vacation FOR THE WIN! (it kinda killed me not

P.S. How are YOU doing, Pranksters? Got anything hilarious going on?

P.P.S. I wrote about shit not to spend your cash on. Should probably include something about NOT going to Vegas when you’re SUPPOSEDLY moving out, but you know what? It’s Vegas. VEGAS BABY!

P.P.P.S. This should also go to show you the NEED for me to learn to be frugal. *hangs head*

I’m not the kind of person who likes to have Master Plans. It’s not that I don’t like a good plan, I just know whenever I shake my fist at the sky and say, “I *will* do (insert action item here),” The Universe laughs, pats my head condescendingly, and says, “Isn’t THAT special.” Come to think of it, The Universe sounds a lot like the Church Lady from the old SNL skit, which is neither here nor there.

Because my plans so rarely work out as according to, well, my plans, I’m used to shrugging my shoulders, cursing a little, and saying dramatically, “Come what may,” or, to be honest, it’s more like, “whateves.”

Instead, I grit my teeth, throw shit at the wall, and see what sticks. And I wonder how I broke two teeth in the span of six months. Here I was thinking it was “stress,” but we all know it was the rocks I’ve been gargling.

Wait, what?

MOVING ON.

Or, I should say, EVENTUALLY moving on, because really, that’s what Life in Limbo means: you duck, cover, and hope that this time, you’re the pigeon and NOT the statue, and tell yourself that if you’re the statue, that pigeon shit on your head makes a LOVELY accessory, isn’t THAT special?

I’d been planning to move into my shoebox apartment, of which I am extremely proud because it’s MY awesome dorm room, October 13. I’d figured that giving myself the opportunity to find things like oh, JOBS and DRINKING glasses might be good, because, hey, drinking water from champagne glasses sounds a lot more refined in theory than in practice. Kinda – but not really – like communism.

I’d slowly begun packing my things, realizing that I’d been in FAR too many weddings, what with the sheer number of black high heeled shoes I own, labeling them all “fragile” (FRA-GEE-LAE) just to confuse myself later on, because hey, moving sucks – gotta get your kicks where you can. If I don’t own a magnificent leg lamp, the best I can do is pretend that one might be in one of the boxes I’ve packed.

I do not, in fact, own this. However, THAT DOESN’T MEAN I CAN’T PRETEND.

Late last week, the apartment company called and told me the original apartment in which I was going to be moving into wasn’t going to be vacant any longer – blah, blah, blah owners staying blah blah blah – but that I’d be able to have another apartment. Did I still want to keep my move-in date October 13?

The answer was, of course, a resounding NO.

Not because it would be terrible to stay here a couple more weeks, not because I was quite ready to move, not that I actually owned glasses yet (SOON!), but because it was time. Living in my home, which I’d spent a hell of a lot of the past (counts on fingers) LOT of years, is just a reminder of what’s over. And while I may loathe goodbyes, it’s time for me to pack my happy ass up and move on down the road.

I told the apartment people I’d be ready to move by the end of September, because, well, I am. Days later, I’m still waiting to hear back if my NEW apartment will be ready by this time. I know apartment people are busy, and while I’ll usually use my patented, “stalk you until you tell me what I need to know – good or bad,” these are the people I’ll be renting from. As such, it’s probably a better idea NOT to piss them off or come across as “that crazy chick who calls every five minutes.”

So I wait. I pack, hoping I’m not going to be wearing the same outfit for the next 4 weeks, and I plan ahead, even while The Universe giggles in my direction.

While I wait, I play with this, which is pretty much window shopping for me (especially since they give away cool shit for free), while I wait.

And I research how to live on my own, how to cut costs, and what I can do to ensure that I don’t fall on my ass too hard. Learning how to live frugally? Kinda awesome.

Part I

Part II

One upon a January afternoon, three dumbasses walked into the ghetto (click to read the story), armed with bags of costumes and more makeup than a stripper could possibly use in her lifetime on the pole, which was a good thing, because we were on our way to LOOK like hookers – BAD hookers, I should add.

We were on our way to a photo shoot, which you’d think would be something that, as a child who grew up thinking the cameras in her face were actually paparazzi capturing her every blunder, I’d have been excited about, but I as I’d had to retake Yee Old Thanksgiving Family Portraits so often that I’d never learned that turkey was actually supposed to be warm, I wasn’t.

I was dead nervous.

Partially, it was the horrifying outfit I was wearing, so unlike the t-shirt and jeans I’d thrown on in the meantime. After Band Back Together had taken over the Blogger Body Calendar, we were all EYE OF THE TIGER about the 2013 calendar. Which I was in. You can call me “Ms. January, if’n you’d like,” or you can call me “Al,” if you don’t.

I’d ordered the outfit from some dance supply company, and it was too big, which meant my boobs flopped around like oranges in tube socks.

While the jaunty, spangly beret came with the awful oufit, I decided that I didn’t particularly want to wear it, perched atop my head like the world’s most ridiculous acorn cap – although to be fair, it may have made me APPEAR to be smarter – we all know that objects in mirror are stupider than they appear. The hat was no exception.

Even my daughter, who loves a good shiny almost as much as I do, decided it was hideous and refused to pose for a picture in it. Guess she’s got better taste than I do. Plus, it appears that if you wear the hat, you lose your calves and feet, and while I’m not entirely sure that WON’T happen with me one day, I’d rather not expedite that particular process. I’m rather fond of my feet, which do things like ensure I can walk into the kitchen to make ridiculously terrible coffee.

Anyway, I’d been waiting and waiting for the stylist to show up before Dawn and The Guy Formerly On My Couch were all, “Fuck, Becks, come here – let US style you.” So I did. What else could I do? Find some hooker and make her apply makeup more expertly? It was WAY too early in the morning for hookers.

Instead, my two “friends,” armed with a crimping wand and some makeup we found around the photo studio did my makeup in such a manner that I appeared to be a hideously BAD Diana Ross imposter, one of those things you just don’t wake up one morning and say, “today? I will do my BEST (WORST) Diana Ross impression.”

The pictures turned out better than expected, and all was right with the world.

Well, until I had to walk back to the car looking like a half-priced Diana Ross imposter, wishing I could stand around taking photos of the area without someone trying to buy a happy ending for 5 bucks.

I sorta forgot about the pictures because I’ve been a little busy with stuff-n-things, until Dawn reminded me, once again, that I needed to pull my head from my bung and LOOK AT THE DAMN pictures. Am I the only one who loathes looking at pictures of themselves? I can’t be. Because I totally do. I was basically all, *covers eyes* “WOW THAT LOOKS, *squinches up face in what I hoped would look like interest and not horror, * AMAZING!”

I can’t believe anyone puts up with me, either.

Anyway, the 2013, Band Back Together: I Am The Face Of Calendars are both ready and on sale – we’re doing a presale right now because obviously, cheaper is better (OR SO I HEAR).

Front Cover:

Back Cover:

If you’d like a pretty awesome calendar, even if it’s so you can hurl darts at my face, you can totally get one here.

So, um, what are you supporting when you buy this?

Keeping the lights on over at Band Back Together. Why? Isn’t that shit free?

Oddly, no. To handle the volume of work the site does, we rely on donations – often out of my pocket – to keep the servers whirring and clicking away.

Proceeds from the 2013 Band Back Together Calendar will be used for outreach efforts in 2013.

Band Back Together runs as a nonprofit, meaning we do not profit from any incoming funds. All proceeds go directly into Band efforts such as server costs or outreach efforts. As of this writing, we have not received a federal nonprofit status, therefore purchases or donations are (unfortunately) not tax deductible at this time.