Why yes, I did ask another parent if she were an escort...

In case it is not ragingly clear, I have this embarrassing tendency to say exactly what I think in situations, even when it would be more prudent to hold my tongue.

I will give you a few examples. I toyed with the idea of being a Montessori teacher for quite some time and ultimately decided against it. The other day, I ran into one of my kids' former teachers and she asked me if I was still considering teaching. Me: "No, I decided I wouldn't be the best at it because I only really like smart kids."

Another time, my kids and I were at a Saturday afternoon Halloween party where the grown-ups were all milling about upstairs while a magician entertained our kids in the basement. One of the new parents in Jojo's class was dressed in a very fancy outfit and I asked her about it (since the rest of us looked like we were getting ready for dinner at Applebee's). She said she was about to go to work. Me: "Are you an escort?" I swear, it sounded funny in my head. It turned out that she is a violinist for the Lyric Opera.

Happily, I am the first to admit this flaw in myself (and in case you are concerned, the "escort" is now one of my closest friends). I am also the first to recognize that I am frequently wrong about things. I say this not because I feel that I am wrong about anything, but in the future, when I happen to be wrong about something, you can remember this about me.

I used to ask this question in college (which now has been spun out and derivated into an FB phenomena that bears no resemblance to my original question but trust me, it came from my brain): If you were any character in the Hundred Acre Wood, who would you be?

Now most people would say Pooh or Piglet or Kanga or CR. Some of my type A friends might admit to being Rabbit. And my ADD friends mostly answered Tigger. My stage crew theatre friends always said Eeyore. You get the idea.

But me, I was Owl. I have always been Owl. Since I was really little, people would come to me for answers and I would be able to provide them.

You are saying to yourselves that it figures I would choose the smart character. But this is where you are forgetting the nature of Owl. Owl is definitely NOT the smartest character in the 100 Acre Woods. Pooh is. Owl THINKS he is the smartest character in the woods and in his utter confidence, he convinces everyone that he is the smartest. He can't even spell his name right if you recall but that does not stop everyone from going to him as the reading authority.

My friend Ally once caught me spouting misinformation on something and asked me why I was discussing something of which I had no idea. My answer, "Uh, because he asked me about it." Obv.

Apparently, it was not obv to Ally because she then asked why I didn't just say I didn't know. I had to further explain myself, "You see Ally, people are asking because they want an answer. They don't want to hear, 'I don't know.' 'I don't know' is a non-answer and it sucks. I am a provider of answers. Sometimes I am right and sometimes I am wrong but I always have an answer. If nothing else, you can count on me for that."

Ally still likes me (I hope) but she also is the first one to point out that I have no idea what I am talking about. And I love Ally for this.

So now, please consider yourselves officially warned. If you are drinking this Koolaid, you know that it is spiked with a lot of Awesome and an occasional shot of Suck.

Exercise in Humiliation Friday

I have decided to make this a new weekly blog feature because inevitably, I will have some humiliating episode to report and now, I will persevere to save these until Friday. But first, I will start with Awesome because I am a Nerdfighter now and our goal is the promotion of Awesome and the decrease of Suck. Therefore, Awesome must always come first.

AWESOME=

This care package from my friend Jeannie. She is Awesome. It is also Awesome that I now have 25 people who are following me, not that I am playing the numbers game because it can only lead to Suck if I start doing that but it is nice to know that there are others out there laughing at...er, I mean, with me.

PROM by Laurie Halse Anderson is also Awesome. She did this book for all the teens requesting a book about "normal people" and she did it beautifully. "Normal people" is a lot harder to do than you would imagine.

Awesome is also the number of e-mails that I received from my friend Bruce today regarding a school memo that referred to a "suction item" instead of an "auction item." I laughed out loud at least 6 times. (Unfortunately, these "suction" e-mails led to my later humiliation--see below). And finally, Awesome is the fact that Julio comes home tomorrow after being gone for 9 days (you see, I could have put this under Suck but as a Nerdfighter, I am focusing on the Awesome of his return and not the Suck of his being gone). This also plays a prominent role in the below mentioned humiliation.

SUCK=

The fact that I just found out today that all the pithy replies that I have been making to you all via e-mail about your comments on my blog posts are apparently not going to you. They are going to some fellow called "no reply-comment@blogger.com." This makes me very sad because my replies have been incredibly funny, sufficiently obsequious and humble that you have chosen not only to follow me but also to comment, and very well-written. Ask "no reply-comment@blogger.com," he has been rolling on the floor laughing at me all week long. I am waiting for my FB friend request from him soon.

Suck is also my daughter's teacher handing me an enormous basket of classroom laundry to do because it is "our family's turn" with the following note attached to it:

"Christa, sorry there is so much. I forgot to give the laundry to other families for the past two weeks. Can you also wash the teddy bear that is in the basket? I think it is infested with lice."

There are no words. I can't tell you the number of nights I have woken up in a panic that one of my children has lice. This is not unfounded, my daughter is 1 of 3 girls in her entire class who has not gotten lice this year. I thought it was because of her mixed race hair, my hair stylist friend Liz suggests it may be because we don't wash it that often (she's not the smelly kid, she showers frequently, she just has really dry hair and curly-haired people should not overwash).

It is Awesome that we have avoided lice so far. Not that it is that big of a deal, it's just that de-infestation appears to involve a lot of house cleaning and laundry and I always prefer to avoid that sort of thing if I can. Because, you know, cleaning is Suck-y.

And now on to the humiliating...(thanks for hanging in there with me)...

Butter (my 3 yr old) and I got out of music class this morning with 30 minutes to eat lunch and get him to afternoon preschool. I buckled him in, glanced down at my phone and saw that I had received 4 emails from Bruce about the "suction" type-o. I was laughing so hard that I barely registered that my car wasn't starting. Weird. I wiped the tears out of my eyes and tried again. No dice. I tried to take the key out of the ignition and start again but it wouldn't come out. It was stuck and the car wouldn't start.

I called Julio (as if he could help from out of town) but he didn't answer. I called Mark, my back-up husband and he did not answer either. I looked at the clock. 22 minutes to get Butter to preschool. I looked at my phone for two more minutes before heaving a sigh and calling Stan, my mechanic. He told me that he was closing the shop for the day (me: dude, at 11:30? what kind of hours are you all running over there?). I got that teary quiver in my voice. He said he would be there in 5 minutes.

He arrived and fixed the car in 16 seconds. Want to know why? Because I had it in Drive. Not in Park. The key doesn't come out in Drive. The car doesn't start in Drive. Naturally. I was so humiliated. I started doing the babble thing. That never ends well for me.

ME: I am so embarrassed, Stan. I can't believe this. I just am very frazzled because we are a bit late and my husband has been out of town for awhile and he isn't answering his phone.

STAN: You need a friend? I could be your friend.

ME: (feigning innocence at Stan's innuendo): Thanks. You're really great, Stan.

STAN: You need a friend?

ME: I have a husband.

STAN: I'm Italian. (what?)

ME: My husband is really great.

STAN: You need a friend?

ME: Stan, aren't you married?

STAN: Yes. You should shake my hand because it is my birthday.

I shook his hand and Stan pulled me into a strange hug. You all are probably thinking that this is weird and skeevy and it totally is except that Stan is about 100 years old and I have actually watched him doing this same thing to 90 year old women. He may have even asked my husband if he needed a friend when he was in there getting his car fixed a few months ago.

Needless to say, Butter was late for preschool and I will now have to find a new mechanic.

We are having breakfast for dinner in my house tonight. Does a bottle of wine go with sausage and pancakes?

Nerdfighters, Stickies and the Pee/Sex Panel

I am an insomniac. When I am thinking about something, I can't sleep until I resolve it. This is a BIG FAT SUCK for writers of novels because you can't just pull an all-nighter and knock out that 60,000 word resolution. I have taken to leaving myself stickies on my computer to remember my late night musings. This has proven to be a bit of a problem because I am not exactly certain what the following stickies mean:

1. Talent Show Cheez Whiz

2. Do love letters from someone who later realizes he is batting for the other team still count?

3. Walgreens, CVS or Rite Aid?

4. Is Minneapolis K and St. Paul W or vice versa?

Sadly, there are a least a dozen more on my desktop. So not such a good solution after all.

I became a Nerdfighter tonight and somehow feel that I have now aligned myself with a bunch of fabulous (no noun needed here---John Green has turned fabulous into every part of speech, it will no doubt be in the new dictionary along with the ridonculous revision of ridiculous). My ten year plan was revised tonight and it now includes meeting other Nerdfighters at Joss Whedon conventions (with me on the Buffy side and them on the Firefly side).

I was on a panel of parents in support of Montessori education last night. After 15 minutes, it became clear that I was invited to be a panel speaker because the school wanted to show new families how well they deal with crazy. I did try to caveat every statement that I made with the disclaimer: "I am that mom" but after awhile, it seemed redundant. At one point, I actually mentioned that the reason that I didn't want my kids going to our local public school was that when our babysitter was at the junior high, she had to hold her pee all day because she kept bumping into kids having sex in the bathrooms. You could hear crickets chirp in that room. I quickly tried to cover this TMI statement by mentioning that my kids were really bad at holding their pee. Outstanding.

My friend Rebecca gave me a bag of her old love letters. They rule. I feel like I am in junior high all over again because I am secretly pissed that she got WAY better love letters than I ever did in school. I have one crappy poem that I found from my pot-growing ex-boyfriend. It is the worst and one day when I am feeling snarky and ambitious, I just might post it here. (Yes, I totally proofread it and it has so many type-o's that you would think a pot smoker wrote it...oh wait).

Happily, my husband rules. Completely. I don't tell him enough but I am still considering the "Julio rocks my world" tattoo.

Today my hair became a little purple and I feel like greatness will soon follow...