Love me, Daddy

Recently I spotted this article entitled Five Tips to Increase Your Likeability.

At first, I dismissed it. "This doesn't apply to me," I thought. "Who could be more likable than me?" But then I thought of you, my faithful readers, who keep coming back to this site time and time again to read what I've written...and then hurl malicious insults at me. You're as faithfull as hound dogs, but you're as vicious as piranas. Why is it, I wondered, that some bloggers have comment sections that read like award ceremony tributes, brimming with high praise and teary-eyed respect? Could it be that I am not as fabulous and lovable as I thought? That's when I realized that it couldn't hurt to try to increase my likeability, and thus perhaps turn my comments section into the ass-kisspalooza I so often see at other blogs.

Let's go over the main points of this article, and see how it might apply to me.

1. Be positive. The article asks, "Why do you have pet-peeves? What is the point of harboring all of these negative emotions? Be big enough to let them go."

Uh-oh. I can already see this is going to require a total personality overhaul. The kind that requires electroshock therapy, years of medication, and perhaps a partial lobotomy. So does this mean I'm no longer allowed to wish syphilis upon women who pee on public toilet seats? Can I no longer take potshots at my coworkers, my friends, my blog readers, little old ladies and newborn babies? What the hell will I blog about? I guess from now on, I will post only pictures of cute kittens, detailed recaps of TV shows I've watched in the past week, and famous poems that inspire me.

2. Control your insecurities. "Display your faults for all the world to see - mistakes are unifying characteristics which all humans can empathize with."

Okay, no one can accuse me of not displaying my mistakes. You can't say I haven't fastidiously detailed my many, many, MANY flaws for your review and consequent scorn, in my posts entitled 100 Things Wrong With Me Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4, Part 5, Part 6, Part 7, Part 8, Part 9, and Part 10. Should I delve deeper, and reveal even more flaws? Is that what it takes be liked? Fine, then. Here's another Thing Wrong With Me: I buy canned soup with meat in it, and then painstakingly pick out all the meat after I cook it. Every time. Every tiny little scrap of meat. Why? Because that's some very suspicious-looking meat. Why don't I just buy the kind without meat? Because that would rob me of the joy of picking out the meat. Now stop asking silly questions.

3. Provide value. The author makes this point: "Have you noticed that drug addicts and criminals often associate with each other? ....Start surrounding yourself with people of value " Sadly, that means I'll have to say goodbye to most of my friends and nearly everyone in my family, but I'm willing to do it to increase my likability. As for providing value, well, I'll start today. From here on out I vow to teach everyone I see each day, stranger or aquaintance, how to properly cook oatmeal.

4. Eliminate all judgments. "No one is above you and no one is below you. We are all....humans." Amen to that, brother, I've always said so. I think we can agree that was the whole point of my Dear Jackass posts.

5. Become a person of conviction. "This means saying 'no' to disrespect and letting the offending party know that he or she crossed the line with their comment and you did not appreciate it."

This one's tough. I'm not sure how I'm supposed to have convictions without being able to make judgments. However, I do like the idea of telling people off. I have already begun to practice shouting, "You, sir, have crossed the line!" as I angrily toss my head and slam my fist on the table. It feels rather good. This is sure to make people like me.

All in all, this personality makeover is going to be a whole lot easier than I thought. Just think, soon you will all love me! You'll begin stuffing my comments section with the highest praise and the sappiest words of adoration imaginable. Up til now, I've been the only person who adored me and marveled at my genius. Soon you'll all be clamoring for the title of Number One Fan. This is very exciting. Go ahead, start adoring me.

It's your chance to shine.

I don't ask for much from you guys. Okay, sure, I ask you to read my self-important blather, and yes, I ask you to give me "just one more" break and not call Child Protective Services on me. And true, sometimes I ask you to let me stay at your house while I'm hiding out from the Feds. You almost never agree to that request, but it doesn't hurt to ask. But aside from that short list, I really don't ask you for much.

But I'm asking you for help now. Not because I think so highly of your opinion, or because you're someone I love and trust...but more because no one else will come through for me on this. You're all I've got, and that makes my prospects pretty sad.

Still, I beg you: Help me think of a good Halloween costume this year.

The fact that I'm turning to you at all shows how desperate I am. After all, I asked you for help last year, and frankly, your advice blew. And my costume ended up sucking, thanks to your lackluster efforts.

So why do I turn to you again this year? The answer is simple: I'm doing it for you. I hate to think of you feeling badly about yourself after last year's disappointing performance. I don't want you feeling like a failure as a friend. You can't truly flourish and improve as a person if you doubt your own abilities and creativity. So in a selfless effort to help you boost your self-confidence, I hereby entrust you with this challenge: Come up with a spectacular costume idea for me. Imagine how good you'll feel about yourself when you conquer this goal! Envision yourself achieving greatness, really stepping up to the plate to prove yourself to be more than you previously imagined you ever could be. This glorious bit of success could mark the turning point for you, the moment where your world opens up and you begin to understand and utilize the awesome power within you.

I want that for you; I truly do.

Let's review the mediocrity of costumes past:

Examining the above photos, two questions probably spring immediately to your mind:

1) What the hell is that costume in the bottom middle picture supposed to be?

2) And what's with the Bon Jovi hair?

Yeah, I have no idea what that costume was supposed to be. And as for the hair, all I can say is I drank a lot back then. But a quick glance at all the costumes reveals a sad lack of creative flair. Most of these so-called costumes are just glorified slut-suits. I don't have photos from the years I went as a 1920's flapper, or a cheerleader, or a pirate, but rest assured, those were glorified slut-suits as well. And don't get me wrong, I'm not above a slut-suit this year. I'd just like to be a little more creative with my costume, be it wholesome and virginal, or cheap and tawdry. Correction: I'd like you to be a little more creative.

In the more recent past, I've been limited by my desire to do "couples" costumes--which is only limiting in my case because Brian shouted a hearty "NO!" to almost every suggestion I brought forth. He didn't want to do anything complicated, uncomfortable, embarrassing or silly--which left us with few choices. Therefore, in 2005, I was a Catholic school girl and Brian was a priest. In 2004, I was a cop and he was a convict. In 2002, I was a groupie and he was a rock star. Holy shit, this list is making me fall asleep as I type it. Now that I think of it, you guys actually did come up with some good ideas last year, but it was Herr Brian who put the kibosh on almost every one, even though he submitted exactly zero ideas of his own. So this year, I'm scrapping the idea of a "couples" costume. I'm going to wear something fabulous, and he can fend for himself.

So you've got your work cut out for you, but it should be much, much easier than what I asked of you last year. I'll wear anything as long as:

a) I look adorable in it

b) I get big laughs from it, or

c) I can hide a fifth of tequila somewhere in it.

So put on your thinking caps. No internet-surfing this week: You've got a job to do. Now get out there and make your mama proud.

A tough decision was made.

Meet Jade.
She's a female Rottweiler. Sweet, mild-mannered and affectionate, she doesn't bark, jump up, dig or attempt to kill my neighbors. She doesn't beg for food when we eat in front of her. She's no use as a guard dog because of her propensity for licking intruders, but her charm outweighs her shortcomings. She doesn't attempt to get on the furniture or chew up my shoes, and even people who profess not to be "dog people" love her. I've had her since she was 5 weeks old, which was 11 years ago. I trained her myself, and she lives in the house with us. She and I haven't been apart for more than a few days since she was weaned. I love her very much.

Meet Jake.
He's a Caucasian male. Incredibly sweet, and generally fun to be around, he loves Mickey Mouse and my pajama pants with monkeys on them. He's quick to alert us when there's a ball in the vicinity, by pointing at it for about half an hour and shouting "Baaaaa!!!!" over and over, lest we forget or in case we've gone deaf. He's a picky eater who hates having his nose wiped, but his good traits outweigh the bad. He never pees in the bathtub, and has yet to throw any of his belongings or mine into the toilet. He's gentle with pets, and no longer bites me when I'm hugging him. He's fun to tickle. I've had him since he was born 19 months ago, and we haven't been apart more than a few hours since he was forcibly ejected from my hoo-ha. I love him very much.

The two of them, Rottweiler and Caucasian male, get along swimmingly. Neither has bitten the other, and neither has tried to steal food from the other. I never have to break up skirmishes between them or threaten to pick up one of them to beat the other one with. It would seem to be a perfect situation...and yet.

The other day I happened to round the corner just in time to catch Jake on his hands and knees, dipping his face into the dog's water bowl. From what I could tell, he was genuinely shocked to discover how unrewarding the experience was. He gasped and snapped his head up, and if he could talk, I imagine he would have confessed to me that it looked a lot more fun when he saw Jade doing it.

Cute story, right? Not really. Here's what the aforementioned water bowl looked like that day:

I'd like to blame the filth on this... ...and surely some of the blame lies therein, but I know it's my job to clean and properly maintain that water bowl. I'm a bad dog owner, and now my son has cooties as a result of my laziness. So I accept the blame. But the problem remains: I can't keep this kid now. He's been soiled. And yes, goofball, I bathed him. He's had several baths since this horrifying event took place. But who am I kidding? This kind of filth can't be washed away.

Several months ago I tried to get rid of Jake for what I considered a very fair price:

Obviously, he didn't sell, and now his value has plummeted thanks to his recent dip the petri dish. So now I offer you:

Free To A Good Home: One Caucasian male. No need to provide proof of a good home. Your word is good enough. Please come pick him up ASAP.

Where can I get a 55-gallon drum of hand sanitizer?

Looking at this photo of a telephone, where would you assume the telephone was located?

The break room of the local Jiffy Lube?
The Greyhound Bus terminal in downtown Detroit?
A hog farm in Kansas?
The slums of El Salvador?
War-torn Croatia?

Wrong. Wrong, wrong, wrong, and also wrong. The telephone in that photo is in my workplace. Which is not (because you were about to ask, weren't you?) the Greyhound Bus terminal in downtown Detroit, but an otherwise clean and normal-looking office building in the reasonably shiny and attractive Dallas/Fort Worth Metroplex.

Go ahead, have another look:

Shocking, isn't it? More shocking is the fact that I'm the only one who seems horrified or even cognizant of this grime. My coworkers don't even notice the ample filth on this and every telephone in the building, nor do they notice that the receiver often actually emits a stench when you hold it near your face. But then, it would smell bad, wouldn't it? Considering it's coated in more microbes than a coke bottle floating in the sewer, and can safely be assumed to be a breeding ground for at least 14 new viruses as well as 27 established ones.

Bizarre side note: I just looked on Thesaurus.com for a synonym for dust, and it came up with "Mormon rain." Um...may I just take a moment to inquire: What the fuck?

The odd thing is I personally clean this phone on a regular basis, driven to do so by my survival instinct. How can this much muck accumulate again so quickly? It seems to defy the laws of nature, and yet there must be an explanation I'm missing.

Could one of my coworkers be a scarecrow, accidentally scattering dust on the phone every time he answers a call, and I've just been too self-absorbed to notice?

Is the building I work in eroding at an accelerated speed, scattering a mist of sediment from the ceiling so fine that I don't even see it?

Do homeless people parade in here in groups of 40 and 50 at a time just before my shift starts, each taking turns using the phone?

Or is someone screwing with me?

You tell me. I demand answers.

Bizarre side note #2: When I did the Blogger spell check of this post, it advised me to change the word "sanitizer" to snatcher. May I just take a moment to inquire: Where can I get a 55-gallon drum of hand snatcher?

Dear Jackass, Volume 10

Dear Garage Sale Entrepreneur:

The very concept of the garage sale is ingenious. The idea that a person could simply drag his used, unwanted household items out to his front yard and dream up random prices for them, and the buying public would come to him, rather than him coming to them, is a dream come true. Hardly any effort involved on the seller's part, and yet the home gets a good de-cluttering and the homeowner makes a quick buck--and all in cash. A lazy man's dream! And one I embrace wholeheartedly. But let's establish some boundaries, in the name of common decency. Selling your old coffee maker? Acceptable. Selling your kid's outgrown shoes? No problem. Selling your germy bedsheets? ....O..kay, sure. I'll allow that, I guess. But selling your disgusting used panties? No, no, no, no, no, NO. I will not stand for it. Do you really need the ten cents that badly? Please, for God's sake, retain a small portion of your dignity and throw those tattered little bacteria traps in the trash rather than peddling them to your neighbors. And to those of you there who I've seen actually buying panties at garage sales...get away from my blog. You're permanently banned. Take that steaming crock pot of toxic microbes you're stewing up in your nether regions and stink up someone else's blog.


Dear Purchaser of Tiny Figurines:

True, I have a Rottweiler, and no, she's not the first or even the second Rottweiler I've ever owned. So yes, one could infer that I'm a fan of the breed. But where is it written that a person wants a house full of tiny replicas of the things they own in life size? I own a vagina, but I certainly wouldn't want an assortment of miniature vagina figurines scattered across the shelves in my home. What shall I do with this wee porcelain doggie lounging on a wee porcelain couch? Or this stack of fanciful Rottweiler notecards? What kind of bozo would I look like in this horrible Rottweiler t-shirt? And what about me makes you think I like porcelain figurines and cutesy notecards and garish t-shirts, anyway? Where will this end? Next you'll be giving me a jumbo box of Rottweiler tampons. Let's put an end to this before it gets out of hand.

Dear Hysterical Email Forwarder:

I'll confess. Each time I receive an email with a title like "PLEEEEASE REEEEAD!!" I toss it without bothering to open it. It's not so much because I don't have the time, or don't care enough (although both of those are also true), but mostly because your hysteria is unwarranted and self-centered, and wholly inappropriate. Calm down, for Christ's sake. Get a grip on yourself. And when did we decide that adding extra vowels to words made them more important? Well, I won't bow to it. I refuse to "reeeead" your stupid email. Instead, I deeeleeeete it cheerfully and swiftly. Now go fuuuuck yourself, Assswiiipe.

An ethnic cleansing tale your toddler will love!

My 18-month old son loves books. But books have a short life in his hands. He goes through them like some people go through parole officers. So I find it necessary to constantly replenish his book supply as he repeatedly destroys the ones he has. The destruction occurs partly because he likes to flip through his books over and over, looking at the pictures and shouting the names of the things he recognizes, and partly because he also throws them, steps on them, spills things on them, and slices them to tiny shreds with his circular saw. In spite of the fact that he only gets board books--those hard, super-sturdy books you give little kids who are can't be trusted not to eat or defecate on a regular paper book--he still manages to render them unreadable in fairly short order. If I bought all his books at Barnes & Noble, I'd have to peddle ecstasy in the downtown bars to pay for them, so when I'm driving past a garage sale, I'll usually stop to see if they have any bargain kids books.

My criteria when purchasing these books is such: Is it a book? Is it for kids? Is it hard? I'll take it. I don't spend much time leafing through them inspecting the content. For 25 cents, I figure I can just buy it now, check it out later, and toss it if I don't like it for whatever reason. But what's not to like? Ninety-nine percent of the time, they're harmless little narratives about a bunny who loves flowers, an impish boy who befriends a toad, a ladybug looking for her mommy, or a ball that bounces super high.

Why am I telling you about my garage sale book-buying jaunts? Because it will help explain why my toddler has a board book about baby killing.

As mentioned above, I don't peruse these books when purchasing them. So when I saw this little gem, it seemed harmless enough:

Now, I don't normally go for the Bible-story books. Usually I find these stories to be not very fun-looking, and let's face it, my kid is only a year and a half old. What he's really looking for in a book is a picture of a kitty or a doggie or a balloon, not a picture of a burning bush or a pillar of salt. So I try to stick with what looks simple enough for a kid to grasp. But I examined the cover of the book and saw what you see above--a baby in a basket, some water, some birds, some friendly-looking, smiling folks. Seemed like a winner. So I bought it, along with a Clifford The Big Red Dog book and a Dr. Seuss book.

At home, I tossed it onto the massive, towering pile of Jake's books and forgot all about it for a couple of weeks. Jake put it in his regular rotation of reading (okay, pointing at and slobbering on), and it wasn't until yesterday that I happened to sit down and look through it with him. All was well and good on page one, but at page two we hit a roadblock:

In case you can't read the fine print, or in case you think your eyes must be deceiving you, yes! It really does say "The King of Egypt thought there were too many Hebrews in his country, so he gave the order that all Hebrew baby boys were to be killed." Note the cartoonish illustration (properly fashioned in the primary colors that best capture a toddler's eye) of a frantic mommy clutching her infant while an ominous-looking fellow with a baby-slicing sword ransacks the place.

Don't get me wrong--I'm not the kind of person who advocates censoring books. But I was thinking I'd hold off teaching jake about infanticide until he was at least 2 years old. There's plenty of time to discuss murder and slaughter of all kinds once he starts potty training. At some point, I plan to incorporate the holocaust into his bedtime stories, but I was thinking I wouldn't start that until we move him from his crib into a toddler bed.

So for now, I'll tuck this perfectly normal, perfectly healthy children's book away, and pull it out again when Jake is old enough to pronounce the word genocide.

And the prize for "Most Unusual Birthday Gift" goes to...

I've said it before and I'll say it again: The best part about birthdays isn't the presents.

Well, I mean, unless you've got incredibly rich friends who give you sports cars and tropical vacations as gifts. In that case, the presents might be the best part about birthdays. But in my case, considering my most "affluent" friends are the ones who aren't currently living in dumpsters, it's totally true: The gifts aren't the best part. The best part is being surprised by how many people remember it's my birthday, and actually care. My birthday was August 1st, and for about the span of a week, I was repeatedly surprised by how many people made a point to wish me "Happy Birthday," whether by calling, emailing, text messaging, or sending their Cambodian servant boy to my door with a fruit basket.

(I was kidding about the dumpster thing. My friends mostly all have jobs and homes. No way would a person be able to afford a Cambodian servant boy if they didn't even have enough money to pay their own rent. Oh, sure, I know what you're thinking: "Cambodian servant boys come cheap, right? I mean, if they're paid at all, it's probably slave wages," and yes, of course that's true. But you still have to feed and clothe them, and that takes money, buster. Believe me, I've done the math. Hoo boy, have I done the math.)

So yes, a touching array of birthdays wishes, and heck, some really, really great gifts thrown in there as well. It would have been an excellent birthday if it ended there, but no! This year brought one extra surprise that I bet none of you got this year for your birthdays. See, up to this point, you've been reading along and thinking, "Yeah, yeah, big deal. I get calls and emails and I get gifts on my birthday, too. So you've got friends; join the club. This post sucks. I came here to read something that doesn't sound exactly like a paragraph from my own life." Patience, asswipe. Read on.

I had just made my way out of bed on the morning of my birthday, and was crawling on my hands and knees toward the coffee pot when the doorbell rang. My hand, outstretched toward the coffee filters, retracted like a slingshot as I assumed the fetal position and commenced trying to wedge myself under my fridge, whimpering like a dog. When the doorbell rings that early, it can only be johnny law coming to take me back to jail for yet another parole violation. My mind raced. How the hell did they find out I've been trafficking in Cambodian slaves? Who snitched? I knew I shouldn't have trusted that guy with the eyepatch, the one who called himself, "Chainsaw Mike." Who gives themselves nicknames like that? Rat bastard.

But my fears were put to rest once I low-crawled to the window and peeked through the blinds to see the FedEx truck. So I wasn't going back to prison after all. But still, I was perplexed. I hadn't ordered anything recently. As I accepted the envelope from the courier, I wondered, "What in God's name can this be?" For someone to spend $20 to send something to me Priority Overnight, it must be very important. Did a relative die? Is someone I love sick? Did I win a million dollars? Are my services urgently needed somewhere far away? Am I being summoned to appear in court? Did one of my exes test HIV positive? What the hell could be so important, so time sensitive?

Any guesses? Don't bother, you'd be wrong. Well, unless you guessed "cock soup," that is. Inside the envelope was this little birthday gift:

Yes, I have some very odd friends. The kind of friends who:

a) Are thoughtful enough to remember my birthday.
b) Spend a lot of time thinking about cock.
c) Are willing to spend $20 to make sure a 65 cent joke reaches its destination on time.

I don't know who conceived the idea of overnight shipping, but do you think this is what he had in mind? I picture him, whoever he was or is, feeling very self-important and do-gooderish. "Overnight shipping--this will revolutionize the way people live and do business! Important papers, transplant organs, money, prized possessions, pets, heirlooms, important projects--they can all be shipped overnight! This will save people money, earn people money, save time, save lives! And the best part: Packages of soup mix with funny-sounding double-entendre names can be shipped in just one day!"

So thank you, Wombat and Sally. I can honestly say I've never gotten an overnight delivery of cock.

Wait.

I mean, I can honestly say I've never gotten cock shipped to me via FedEx.

I'm a freak in bed.

But not the way you think, you filthy, godless pervert. Christ, is that all you people think about? You disgust me.

No, what I mean is that I'm a high-maintenance sleeper. While some of you could sleep easily and peacefully while strapped to the blade of a windmill, or being dragged behind a pickup truck, I require an elaborate list of specific items and ideal room conditions to get me through the night.

Here's the short list of idiosyncrasies that would make a normal person cringe at the thought of sleeping in the same bed with me:

1. I need a full wardrobe change by my bedside. I go to bed in long-sleeves and long jammie pants, but keep shorts and at the ready. This is because I go to bed chilly, but wake up later a little warm, and change into the t-shirt. Still later, I may wake up and change into the shorts, or just lose the pants. But I could never go so far as to sleep in a tank top (or less) because I'd wake up cold in about 20 minutes. Don't ask me why there's a world of difference between a tank top and a t-shirt, but those few extra inches of fabric make all the difference between getting a warm, comfortable night's sleep, or laying wide awake in a fetal position cursing God and listening to my teeth chatter.

2. I usually get up to change the thermostat in the night. I leave it set at 76 degrees all day and most of the night, but when I wake up hot in the middle of the night, I sometimes get up to change it to 75. Later, I'll probably wake up chilly and change it back to 76. I hear you out there thinking, "Um...hey Dumbass. One degree probably makes no difference at all. Why not just turn the overhead fan on instead?" I can't do that because I can't sleep with air blowing directly on me. And stop calling me Dumbass. I refuse to be insulted on my own blog.

3. I can't sleep with any extraneous noise in the room. No radio, no TV, etc. Also, no snoring, which makes my husband a poor candidate for a sleep partner. But if I cram earplugs in my ears and turn on a small bedside fan, I may be able to make it a couple hours before having to wake him up with a gentle karate chop to the skull and asking him to turn over. Then I may be able to make it another hour before the racket resumes, causing me to get up and move to the floor. That little bit of added distance between my ears and his honking make it possible for me to sleep fairly well from that point on. At least, until I wake up for another wardrobe change.

4. I need just the right combination and arrangement of pillows. One medium-fluffy under my head, one unfluffy to put between my knees (when I'm sleeping on my side), or under my knees (when I'm on my back), and one fat-fluffy to put next to me. Plus I need Roe, the teddy bear I've slept with since I was in junior high, to throw an arm over. Many nights I get all snuggled down in bed, nice and comfy, only to realize I'm missing one of these crucial pillows or the aforementioned teddy bear, and I have to get back up and track down the missing component. True, all these accoutrements leave almost no room for my husband to squeeze into the bed, but luckily for me he's only of medium build, and can manage to fit.

5. I need just the right blanket. Usually that means a down comforter, but in the absence of that, I can settle for two or three blankets--just enough to crush a normal person under the sheer weight of them.

6. I need chapstick handy all night. I apply it before I go to bed, but it's likely I will need a reapplication in the night. Otherwise I may be distracted from sleep by the thought of my lips cracking like a baseball glove left out in the sun.

7. I am guaranteed to make at least two, possibly more, bathroom trips. I have a bladder the approximate size of one of those little rubber coin purses your grandpa carries in his pocket. And if I happen to have a couple of glasses of wine on a Saturday night before going to bed, I might as well just haul my pillows, wardrobe change, teddy bear and chapstick into the bathroom and sleep in there.

8. I like to sleep in pitch darkness, which means that even the smallest bit of light is unacceptable. Not only is a nightlight bothersome, but get this: We have a security system on our house which has a control panel in our bedroom. A tiny green dot of light signals to us that the house is "safe," whereas a green blinking dot means that a door or window has been opened. Either way, blinking or not, the green light is there, and though it's only about the size of the head of a nail, it bugs me. I cover it with a small square of black electrical tape so that I can't see it. True, that means we can't tell if the house is "safe" or if a door or window has been opened by a crazed prison escapee who is perhaps even now in the process of rummaging around in our kitchen for just the right knife for cutting my jugular, but let's remember what's important here: A good night's sleep.

In summary, I'm a huge pain in the ass to sleep with. Luckily for me, my husband has no idea. He is so loaded down with great qualities that they're actually coming out of his ears--I've seen it--and among them is the fact that he sleeps like a corpse. He doesn't care if it's 100 degrees or 20 degrees in the room, if the bed is piled precariously high with stuffed animals, pillows and gardening tools, if I get up 75 times or zero times in the night, or if there's a thin cotton sheet or 14 bison pelts covering him. He can sleep fully clothed or dressed only in a pair of Victoria's Secret angel wings (don't judge him), he can sleep in an utterly quiet room or in a bottle cap factory. It's yet another example of the thousands of ways that I'm basically unfit for a relationship, yet my husband is so agreeable and so easy to live with that he doesn't notice. He actually thinks I'm perfect--which, as you and I both know, is preposterous.

But don't tell him any different. I have a good thing going here, and I don't need you ruining it.

Beware of strangers bearing candy

Did I ever tell you about the time I was sexually assaulted by met Hoss, of Old Horsetail Snake? If you're a reader of his blog (and who isn't?) I bet you've bought into his portrayal of himself as some sweet old guy, hanging around the old folks home chatting up the nurses and cracking a joke or two. Forget that. The man's a cad, 100% pure evil.

He was passing through town on his way to visit his friend Tish (don't call her "Trish," or she'll gut you like a flounder), and would be at the Dallas/Fort Worth airport for a short layover. The plan was for me to meet him at his gate and have a nice visit with him before his connecting flight took off. There was no time to go anywhere for a meal or a cup of coffee, so we would just sit in the airport and chat each other up.

Little did I know what fate really had in store for me.

I showed up at his gate with an expectant smile on my face, looking this way and that for what I pictured him to be: A sweet older gentleman sitting politely, hands folded in his lap, giving an amiable nod to the travelers who passed by him. As I was scanning the area for someone who resembled the friendly-faced fellow in the cap pictured to the left in this paragraph, two hands grabbed my ass and I felt hot breath on my neck as someone growled, "Hey baby, you come here often?" Naturally, I was shocked and outraged, and quickly spun around to slap the offender across the face, when I recognized him from the pictures I'd seen on his blog--it was Hoss! I immediately began to stammer and stutter, completely at a loss for how to respond to this incredibly inappropriate "greeting." He just smiled and swatted me on the tush again and said, "Yeah, I'm used to that. The ladies are often stunned at my good looks." True, he was dashing, as most villains are, but his bad-boy good looks were not enough to make up for his lecherous, depraved behavior. This man was just bad, through and through.

Oh, alright, I confess: This whole post has been a lie. Well, the part about meeting Hoss in the airport is true, and the part about him being dashing is true too, but the ass-grabbing bit was pure fabrication. He was every bit as sweet and charming as I expected, and a perfect gentleman, at that. He was just as smart and funny and kind as you'd assume from reading his blog. The truth hardly makes for edge-of-your seat reading, though, so sometimes I have to throw in a celebrity tabloid-style lie or two to keep you folks interested.

I doubt Hoss will be foolish enough to try to meet up with me again, though--I gave him a Spam snowglobe as a gift in the airport that day, and while that sort of thing is inexplicably hilarious to me, it just makes most people think I'm mentally challenged in some way. So unless he wants more questionable gifts heaped upon him, or another libelous blog post written about him, old Hoss will follow his gut instinct and stay far away from the Dallas/Fort Worth area in the future.

July 14 is "Cannibal Cow Day!"

Are you:

-Hungry?
-Desperate for attention?
-Utterly lacking in dignity or self-respect?
-Willing to do humiliate yourself for a handful of fast food?
-In possession of a full-body cow suit?

If you answered "yes" to the above questions, you're in luck! Because the Chick Fil-A fast food restaurant chain has come up with the most brilliant promotion known to man. Observe the ad below:Wait, wait--I know what you're thinking. It sounds too good to be true, doesn't it? When you hear of something so wonderful, so unusual, and totally free, it's only natural to be suspicious. And yet! I assure you I did not Photoshop this ad or alter it in any way--it really is a true and valid promotion. Yes! You can schlep your retarded ass into a public restaurant wearing a full cow costume on July 14 and receive a free combo! That's...hell's bells...nearly four dollars worth of processed chicken!

Careful though, cowboy. Read the fine print. It has to be a full cow costume. Don't try to sneak by just wearing a cow's head mask, or half-ass it in only a set of hooves and a tail. If you want to reap the bounty of a whole combo meal--that's a sandwich or nuggets, fries and a drink--you have to be tricked out from head to tail in a full-body cow suit. Hopefully you've already got a couple of those hanging in your closet, but if not, you can probably buy a decent one for $80 or so.

At this point, the laziest among you may be thinking, "Um...shouldn't I just keep my $80 and use it to buy myself twenty combo meals over a period of weeks or months?" Harrumph. Frankly, you embarrass me and shame yourself with such uninspired thinking. Sure, it would be way simpler, cheaper and easier to skip the whole costume idea and just pay for your deep-fried fast food like anyone else, but in doing so, you'd miss out on the opportunity to make a total jackass out of yourself and look like a moron as you sit on a plastic chair in the local Chick Fil-A restaurant trying to ram a chicken nugget through the mouth hole of your filthy cow suit.

So hurry; time's a-wasting. July 14 is the big day, and since it's nowhere near Halloween, it's not going to be easy to find the required attire in the local stores. Your best bet is to order it on the internet and pay for expedited shipping, just to be safe.

Oh, and email me a photo of yourself with your yummy prize clutched triumphantly between your hooves. I want to savor the moment with you.

Happy Birthday Kristina!

My friend Kristina (pictured on the left) is a great catch. If you're a single guy (or hell, maybe even a girl), you would definitely try to hit on her. If you're not single, you would probably try to hook her up with one of your best friends. She's adorable, she's tiny (size 3, for Christ's sake, something which I previously thought existed only in movies and fictional novels), she's fun, and she's incredibly loyal. Why do I tell you this? Because I need your help.
There are many guys who are interested in this totally hot friend of mine, but Kristina has apparently been drugged or hypnotized by her ex-boyfriend, because she cannot seem to let go of him in spite of his noticeable lack of appealing character traits. Although they're broken up, he manages to show up on the scene only every once in a great while, and only when he gets a whiff of the fact that she may be showing some interest in a new guy. He sticks around just long enough to get her to forget about the new guy, and then poof, he's gone again like Houdini.

Clearly, she needs an intervention, but this is a tricky business because she doesn't see anything particularly distressing about this ongoing scenario. So it's up to me to get him out of the picture, but how? Below are some possible solutions I've come up with so far, for your review.

1. The most obvious answer is to kill him. I watch enough true-crime TV to know that it can be done; all I'd need is a crawlspace in my house. This would be the surest way to free Kristina up for the opportunity to find happiness with a decent guy. A great plan! One small downside: A lengthy jail sentence. I am too prissy to flourish in the far-from-plush accommodations I've heard can be found in most prisons. These places probably don't even offer TiVo, much less a decent pedicure. I love Kristina, but maybe not quite enough to sleep on a bacteria-laden cot and miss the entire season of 24 for the next several decades.

2. What if I could cause Kristina to develop amnesia? On the surface this sounds like a total win. She would forget all about what's-his-name, and her life could go on as if he never existed. Apparently it's not hard to get amnesia--I've seen cartoons in which a person merely falls down and gets a bump his head, and bam! He forgets his own name. I could just give her a good shove, and that would probably solve everything. On the other hand, though, she might also forget me, and upon meeting me again, might not like me very much. I don't want to take that chance. For reasons that mystify me, and probably you as well, she loves me now, and I don't want to risk losing that. It's probably not all that easy to make new friends when you have an incredibly disagreeable personality.

3. I could cause him to develop amnesia. He'd forget about Kristina! He'd stop showing up in town; no more late-night drunken phone calls! A big upside is that I'd thoroughly enjoy giving him an excessively hard shove. Then, just to be safe, I'd put the confused chap on a bus to Wisconsin, where hopefully he'd stay, since he wouldn't be able to remember where his hometown was. True, people in Wisconsin would be very angry with me, but screw them. I have no pity for people who go to football games--or anywhere--wearing hats shaped like wedges of cheese.

4. I could introduce Kristina to such a fabulous, irresistible guy that she would totally lose interest in her ex. This is where you come in. I think I made it pretty clear in the past that I don't have the kind of male friends I'd trust my girlfriends with. But you! You're not like me! You've probably led a sane life, filled with normal, mentally healthy friends and acquaintances who have good jobs, no criminal records, and no periodic, state-mandated drug tests. So I'm calling on you for help. Gather up those fine, upstanding young men for my review and approval, and once I deem them suitable for my dear friend Kristina, I will set them upon her like a pack of dogs, and may the best man win her love and affection. I'm sure her ex has his good points, but we're talking about one of my very best friends here--Kristina is someone I love very much, and she deserves someone who loves her at least as much as I do, someone who would treat her with the care and respect she deserves.

In the event that you don't know any single, lovable, disease-free young men, I will also be accepting better suggestions than the ones I came up with above. Know how to eliminate an undesirable guy without landing on death row or being doomed to a life on the run? That's the kind of information I can use. See, Kristina's birthday was Thursday, and although we went out and celebrated with food, booze and gifts, it would be a really great birthday gift if I could solve this little problem for her. So please help. You've spent enough time merely reading my pearls of wisdom and words of poetic beauty on this site; now it's your turn to give something back.

Come on, get busy.

This just in: People are bad.

I've spent a lifetime being foolish.

I naively believed in the good of man; I truly believed that we are all born good, and while circumstances can cause some of us turn a little bad, for the most part we remain basically decent. It pains me to admit that I was wrong. People are born evil.

But what a flower-sniffing sap I was. Once, in a college writing course, my professor asked us to pick one of two viewpoints--that people are basically good or basically evil--and write a paper defending that viewpoint. Naturally, being the wide-eyed young idiot that I now realize I was, I ranted on about how of course people are basically good, and only through extreme influence do we sometimes, tragically, take a misguided turn for the bad. What an idealistic little Mary Poppins asshole I was.

Today, cold, hard truth smacked me in the face. I was sitting around minding my own business (probably musing about how the world is one big happy Brady Bunch episode) when I overheard a cherub-faced little boy of about 8 chattering away to his father about a cartoon he had seen on TV recently, featuring Wile E. Coyote and the Road Runner. The distracted father was trying to do some work on his laptop while the kid yammered on, excitedly describing one of the coyote's elaborate anvil-as-weapon attempts on the road runner's life. The father muttered the occasional, "Mmm-hmmm," or "wow," in a flat, monotone voice. The kid was too young to understand that his father wasn't listening to a word he was saying, so he took his time meandering to the end of the story, wherein, as you might imagine, the road runner escapes once again, leaving the frustrated coyote steaming. The kid was the picture of childlike innocence, so excited about this silly cartoon...until! He wrapped the whole thing up by wistfully commenting, "I hope someday the coyote catches the road runner." To which Father Clueless mumbled, "Yeah, that'd be great."

What? This adorable little serial killer in training wants the coyote to catch the road runner?! What kind of parents raise a little monster like this? That'd make for a fun cartoon, wouldn't it?

Scene One: Coyote chases road runner; road runner narrowly escapes, a sweet, innocent smile on his beak.Scene Two: Coyote devises new plan to catch bird; road runner narrowly escapes once again, emitting an exceedingly cheerful, "Meep, meep!" and continuing to look angelic and huggable.

Scene Three: With grim resolve, coyote chases road runner again, this time with a fresh look of wild-eyed determination. At the end of a long, feverish chase, Coyote catches road runner, ripping into the bird's delicate throat with his teeth, amid the bird's tortured screams of agony. Blood-spattered coyote gleefully feasts on road runner's tattered carcass by the side of the highway, while cars whiz by, the occupants indifferent to the carnage.

Scene Four: Crazed from the taste of blood, the coyote goes on a maniacal killing spree, butchering and devouring every animal and man that crosses his path. Eventually, when he has decimated the entire population of the dessert, he begins to infiltrate other cartoons, slaughtering Mickey Mouse, Spongebob Squarepants, the Powerpuff Girls, the Afflac duck, the Geico gecko and the Energizer Bunny, as well as scores of others. The 8-year-old boy mentioned above sits in front of his TV cackling with demonic glee, rubbing his chubby hands together as he begins to map out his own plan to kills his parents, neighbors and classmates and boil them all together in one massive stew pot.

So there you have it; my rosy view of the world has been shattered. I now admit that yes, the world is a steaming cesspool filled with villains and cads, and when empty-headed hayseeds like myself stubbornly insist that people are innocent and kind, our foolish naivete only makes it easier for the scoundrels to pillage and plunder.

Well, no more. From this moment on, I will no longer bumble through life with a fairy tale notion of the goodness of mankind. I will approach every stranger with the belief that he is not a friend, but a bloodthirsty killer on a rampage, more likely to gut me like a fish than say hello. I will sleep with one eye open. From here on out, it's kill or be killed.

And I'm starting with that little 8-year-old, cartoon-loving murderer-on-training wheels. Next time he looks up, he's going to see an anvil blacking out the sky.

Give from the heart. It'll make you feel better about yourself.

In the span of a week, both Brian and I received letters informing us that our financial/personal/medical records may have been compromised, and are possibly in the hands of an evil villain who will use them to first destroy us, and then topple our government and take over the White House.

Well, the letters didn't exactly go into those specifics, but I can only assume that will be the eventual outcome. I watch TV. I know how these things work.

First came my letter from the Department of Veterans Affairs. Yes, I'm a veteran. Please remember me on those holidays in which you revere all heroes of this country. During my few short years in the Army Reserve, I heroically performed such tasks as bravely typing memos, fearlessly moving things from one corner of a room to another, boldly stuffing a rucksack full of unnecessary items and schlepping it up a hill, valiantly staying awake during classroom instruction, and courageously consuming an incredibly diverse range of beige or grey food items. Now, as it happens, a VA employee has managed to lose track of a laptop computer which contained the records of many thousand current and former servicefolk such as myself. Jack Bauer has been contacted, so there's an excellent chance the country will be saved from total destruction, but who knows how many lives will be lost in the process?

And since Jack's attempt to save the world will be thwarted and stalled at every twist and turn by everyone he knows with the exception of maybe one or two brilliant, clever people who clearly idolize him and/or want to sleep with him, this could take a while. In the meantime, I have to plan for my future.

The missing data contains my medical and financial records, and I've been trying to think of ways to protect myself against the misuse of this sensitive information. First, there's the financial data. I have extremely good credit at this point. (Surprised, asshole? Actually, me too.) But I know that it would take less than a year for an evildoer to wad my lovely credit up in a ball and wipe his villainous backside with it, eventually leaving me bankrupt, starving and homeless, begging on the street for money to buy a nonfat, no-foam latte at Starbucks.

To insure against the possibility of abject poverty, I am hereby setting up a "Friends of Karla" donation program. I'll accept donations from you (yes, you) in any amount, but I think we both agree that it's pretty tacky to donate in anything other than multiples of $100. Because Bank of America, where my modest checking account is kept, is probably not logistically able to handle the thundering avalanche of cash that will surely come crashing in the moment I post this, I have had the foresight to set up several overseas bank accounts, so that I can keep the money spread out across several continents. I am also prepared to invest heavily in tech stocks and Purina dog food, to further distribute the cumbersome pile of money. Some of the cash I will simply bury beneath my house for quicker access. I realize there may very quickly come a time when I need to think of even more options for housing the ever-increasing influx of donations, but I'll cross that bridge when I come to it. For now, I simply ask that you reach deep into your pocketbooks, your friends' pocketbooks, your mother's jewelry box, and your boss's cash register and donate whatever you can, as often as you can, until it hurts, to save this poor veteran from the clutches of impending disaster.

Next, there's the matter of the medical records. While I never wanted it to get out that I had such extensive and repeated STD testing in the 90s, I feel that a little bit of embarrassment is the least of my worries here. I have no idea what evil could be wrought by a criminal in possession of medical records, but I don't have time to sit around and speculate. All I can do now is prepare for the worst, so I'm setting up a "Friends of Karla" Organ Donation program. I ask you to donate whatever bodily organs you can spare, up to and including your heart, lungs, kidney, and skin. Got a friend with a nice, healthy liver? Appropriate it and send it in, ASAP. I'll also be accepting donations of blood, type B Negative. (Nice, huh? My blood type and my attitude toward life are the same! Ho, ho--I tell you, even in the face of disaster I still have a sense of humor. Don't you admire my strength, my courage?)

There's no time to waste, since we have no way of knowing what plans this medical records thief has, or how quickly he will be able to act on them. I have already bought several large, commercial-grade freezers to accommodate the organ and blood donations when they start rolling in, and I have alerted the US mail service, Federal Express and UPS that they will need to increase their staff for the next several months, lest they be buried in a mountain of packages and letters as a result of your unrelenting generosity and humanitarianism.

So please, I hate to seem rude, but there's no time for you to sit around reading this blog today. You've got to mobilize your friends, family, coworkers, acquaintances, even total strangers, to get started now collecting and sending donations.

Oh, and Brian got a letter too; this one from the company that handles his student loan. Apparently someone who worked for a records management company that handles the financial data for many thousands of current and former college students has taken a bunch of those records hostage and is willing to trade them for cash, guns, an unlimited supply of Gummy Bears, and safe passage to Brazil. Or hell, maybe they just lost the records, I can't recall, but I do remember the letter saying that the data had been compromised. I'd set up a donation program for Brian, too, but I worry that doing so might decrease donations to my own fund, with some people dividing up their meager life savings between the two funds. Let him figure out his own way out of this mess; I'm looking out for number one. If he starts to look hungry I might flip him a couple bucks, but beyond that, he's going to have to be responsible for himself, and dig his way out of financial ruin on his own. If there's one thing I hate, it's someone who's looking for a handout.

I'd better start saving for bail money.

When you're expecting a child, you sit around and daydream about what that child might one day become. Beautiful? Talented? Successful? Kind? Famous? Generous?

A writer? An architect? A scientist? A doctor? The president?

A lover of animals? A good friend? A sympathetic listener? A devoted spouse? A dedicated parent?

You know it's possible for your unborn child to become any of these things, but you gamely promise yourself that you'll love that child even if he or she becomes none of those things. You hope for the best, naturally, but secretly you also pray you have what it takes to love unconditionally even if your baby grows up to be a bit of a disappointment to you as an adult.

I have reached that crossroad in my life as a mother.

Jake had a lot of promise; he really did. He was cheerful and sweet, a quick learner, a big hugger. He rarely cried. He reached all the baby milestones at the appropriate times: Turning over, sitting up, crawling, walking, talking, etc. People told us on a regular basis how charming and adorable he was. And he was fun to be with. Looking back, it's impossible to pinpoint when things started to change, when Jake started to turn bad.

Maybe an outsider could have seen the signs, but I, as his mother, lived with him every day and must have simply missed the subtle changes. Isn't it funny how the closer you are to a situation, the harder it is for you to see it clearly? I wonder now if my friends and acquaintances were talking behind our backs, whispering that Jake was turning into a problem child, that it was a shame we weren't better able to guide him and keep him on track. Why didn't they speak up? What kind of friends are these, to sit back and watch us wander off into peril, rather than reaching out to help yank us back to safety?

But it's silly for me to sit here and place blame. I know that, after all, I'm his mother, and it was my job to guide Jake and help him become the best person he could be. If I'm going to point fingers, I should point at myself, because I'm the one who failed here.

And I know that I should love him unconditionally, but there are things I can't accept. I can't condone drinking and driving, for instance. It's irresponsible, it's dangerous, it's reckless. Yet Jake won't listen to me. In these photos you can clearly see he's behaving like a rabid frat boy, yet he's still in his jammies, barefoot, because it's barely 8 AM. What kind of person is this?

Half an hour later, he's so loaded he barely looks human anymore. And nothing I can say or do will slow him down when he's in this state. He's like Nicolas Cage in Leaving Las Vegas. Except that he's wearing jammies with cartoon dump trucks on them.

What would you do? Take his car away? Sounds like a good plan, since he's clearly not inclined to operate it in a responsible manner, and since he's demonstrated that he's not deserving of the privilege. Yet, when I tried that, I discovered it only encouraged him to commit even more heinous crimes, since he's more than willing to steal a car, even willing to hurt the owner of the car in the process.

I never expected motherhood to be easy, and I don't want to turn this blog into a "poor me" rant about how hard my life is. But I'm reaching out to you. What can I do to stop this little monster from ending up on the FBI's "Most Wanted Toddlers" list?

I know funny people.

Spoken by my attractive redneck friend Kenny in Missouri:

Don't leave me in this bar alone! You know I'll get drunk and end up going home with one o' them taterhogs that's been hitting on me all night!

Spoken by my friend Donna in high school algebra class, while discussing possible senior class trip destinations with our teacher:

KANSAS!? No! If we wanted flat, we'd stay here with Karla!

(And might I just say in my own defense that my very average C cups probably only looked flat next to Donna's very impressive D cups. I would have pointed that out at the time if I could have been heard over the shrieking laughter of my entire class and my teacher.)

Spoken by comedian Artie Lange:

Drinking non-alcoholic beer is like f*!#ing a mannequin.

Spoken by me while 3 months pregnant, upon being asked if I planned to find out the sex of the baby from my upcoming sonogram:

Hell, yes! I don't understand people who say they don't want to find out the sex of the baby until it's born. I want to know everything; I don't want any surprises coming out of my hoo-ha.

Spoken by the plumber who came to a rental house we had just moved into a few years ago, when we called him to fix the backed-up plumbing:

It's probably nothing major. Most times I get called out to a house where the sewage is backing up into the bathtub, and people are afraid it's going to require a major overhaul to fix it. But lots of times it's just sewer rats.

My husband (horrified): Sewer rats?! We have sewer rats?!

Plumber: Well, some people call them tampons. I call them sewer rats.

It's Not Easy Being The Sane One, Part I

For quite some time now, I've suspected that I'm the only sane person in existence on a planet teeming with the mentally ill. I've long been compiling evidence to support my theory, and I think you'll agree that my findings are pretty shocking. The list is long--too long to cram into one blog post, so I'll let you in on just a couple of the facts I've collected that prove that the whole world, (with the exception of yours truly) is batty:

--There are people out there who eat chili with Ritz crackers instead of saltines. Yeah, you read that right. Ritz goddamn crackers! Chili is perhaps the world's greatest food, something to be eaten in winter or summer, for breakfast or dinner. And it's an absolute requirement for anyone with a hangover. The idea that mindless peasants all over the world are fouling this manna from Heaven with the sweetened cardboard that is Ritz Crackers is horrifying and shameful. I can only pray these people will be punished in the afterlife.

--Even as we speak, in bars all across America, millions of people are blithely sipping margaritas made with sweet and sour--and pretending they taste good. Sweet and sour is vile, wretched stuff, and should never be consumed. It's probably perfectly good for rinsing out a kitty litter box or flushing out a radiator, but it's not suitable for the delicate human digestive tract. Its very existence began as a practical joke, I'm sure. Some lazy 20-something bartender got tired of mixing up real lime juice and sugar each time a customer ordered a margarita, so he devised a scheme to make things easier for himself, therefore freeing himself up to take more breaks to sit in his car and get stoned during his shift. At first, he probably just mixed up a huge vat of of lime juice and sugar and stored it in the refrigerator, where it could be swiftly accessed any time a customer ordered a drink. But after a couple of days he probably realized the lime juice was going bad when stored that way--and no way was this lazy prick willing to mix up a new jug daily. So the shiftless swine stopped using lime juice entirely, instead throwing in some limey sugary powdered Koolaid-type crap thereafter known as sweet and sour. His piss-drunk customers didn't notice or complain, so the a-hole bragged to all his bartender friends that he'd found a way to make drinks faster and smoke pot more on his shift than anyone else he knew. The sensation caught on, and voila--fast-forward to the present day, where I can be seen in restaurant after restaurant, bar after bar, year after year, asking waiters and bartenders if I can get a margarita made with lime and sugar instead of sweet and sour, only to be met with a blank stare as if I had just asked if I could please have the manager's panties blended up in my drink. Am I the only sane person left? Why does everyone cheerfully accept drinks made with sweet and sour, when sweet and sour tastes like sugared bile? My liver demands better. Nay, after the hell it's been through, my liver deserves better.

Oh, the list goes on and on. I'll let you in on the rest of it, but I'm sure you're reeling from these first two shockers. Yes, the world is a sick place. Thank God that there's still someone like me--perhaps the only sane one left--to speak the truth and stand up for what's right and decent. Now I call on you, my faithful readers, to join me in my fight. The next time a waiter tries to slip some sweet and sour past you, break the margarita glass over his head and disembowel him with one of the broken shards. Next time you see some halfwit desecrating a bowl of chili with Ritz crackers, ram the spoon up his nose. We can't just sit back and watch the world go to hell in a handbasket.

Thank you.

The Bad Mommy Chronicles, Part II

You've probably figured this out by now, but although I'm a mommy, this is not a mommy blog. That's not because I have anything against mommy blogs or mommy bloggers. It's mostly because I've figured out there's a better than 50% chance that at some point Jake will be taken away from me by the state, and I expect that when that happens, I'll be too busy wallowing in self pity and drowning my sorrow in pure grain alcohol to want to deal with having to start a new blog. I'll want to keep on being Karlababble--after all, I'll have already suffered enough loss at that point without having to also lose my beloved blog, and my beloved (albeit depraved and misguided) blog commenters. While the rest of the world will judge me harshly for being an unfit and dethroned mother, you will still be there for me, if only because you lack the moral compass to understand my crimes.

So no, this is not a mommy blog. However, from time to time I am compelled to inform you of some cute or interesting thing Diaper Butt has done recently. Or, as in this case, some close call in which he narrowly escaped with his life and all four tiny limbs.

All stories in our house these days seem to begin with, "I left Jake alone for a split second, and by the time I turned my back...," and end with a description of a David Blaine-type stunt performed by my toddler. A few days ago, I was cleaning the living room, and had my eye on Jake, who was playing in his room. He was sitting on the floor talking to his toys, which seemed safe enough to me. I went about my cleaning, and after a moment I noticed it was too quiet in the house. This is always a bad sign. When Jake is behaving himself and everything is normal and good, he chatters away ceaselessly--a trait he gets from his father. When I suddenly realize a silence has fallen over the house, it's time to panic. This kind of quiet invariably means Jake has discovered something dangerous and is stealthily trying to get himself killed before I have a chance to interrupt him. When I peered into his room to see what he was up to, I saw that he had climbed up onto the little table by his bed, and was sprawled across it on his belly, legs outstretched behind him as he gripped the edge of the table and peered over it as if he were peering cautiously over the edge of the world's tallest building.

"No!" I scolded him as I picked him up, envisioning him tipping the thing over with his Tony Soprano belly leading the way, subsequently bashing his big head on the floor.

A few mornings later I was getting some breakfast ready for him in the kitchen when I thought of something I wanted to tell Brian, who was in the bathroom getting ready for work. Jake was banging a wooden spoon against the kitchen floor when I left him. I chatted with Brian for a few minutes in the bathroom until I realized the banging had stopped. Taking note that the house was now filled with that "suicide quiet," I knew I'd better locate my chubby little masochist fast. Leaning around the corner to look for him, I saw he was no longer in the kitchen. I found him in the living room, on top of our behind-the-couch table crawling in a tight circle on the glass top as he looked over each edge. "No!" I admonished him as I picked him up, imagining him throwing the whole glassy, irony death trap off balance as he crashed to the floor in a screaming heap.

Today Brian was at home in the living room, having taken note of the fact that Jake was gnawing on toys in the dining room. When Brian heard the sound of one of our ceramic coasters clanking against wood, he sighed and headed for the dining room, thinking Jake had somehow managed to reach far enough onto the table to grab a coaster and had begun banging it against a chair leg. Instead he found Jake standing on the dining room table clutching his coaster, apparently squatting now and then to thunk it against the table top.

So you see my problem; the kid's an adrenalin junkie. Next, I expect to find doing cartwheels on the roof of our house, or possibly scaling the city water tower, or perhaps attempting to bungee jump off of an overpass. This won't look good to the busybodies at Child Protective Services, so I need to take some preventative measures, fast. I'm still fairly new to the whole mommy thing, so maybe some of you more experienced types can take a look at my list of ideas and see which one sounds best:

-Stapling his feet to the floor.
-Chaining a boat anchor to his leg.
-Magnetizing the floors in our house and making him wear magnetic booties.
-Putting a brick in his diaper.
-Greasing up all our furniture with Vaseline so he can't get enough traction to climb on it.
-Putting an inner tube around his middle so he bounces when he hits the floor after falling off a table or chair.
-Putting an Elizabethan collar on him, like the ones pets have to wear to prevent them from licking a wound too much. (This wouldn't solve the climbing problem, but it'd be fun to watch him walk around wearing the thing. Plus it'd make for some funny pictures to post on my blog.)
That's all I've thought of so far. I'd probably have been able to compile a more comprehensive list if I weren't so busy snatching Jake off the various furniture items in my house. What happened to the good old days when a mother could ignore a kid for hours on end and he'd still be in one piece at the end of the day?

I'm an excellent host.

And no, I don't mean "for parasites," although I'm probably good at that, too.

As those of you who insist on peeping in my windows already know, my sister and niece were recently here for a visit. I was a most hospitable and gracious host, the likes of which would put Martha Stewart to shame. (I mean, more shame than her recent prison stint, even.)

First, there was the welcome banner I made for their arrival. How many of you put out welcome banners for your guests? Not many, I'd guess. Which is a shame, because it's such a nice gesture, and really lets your guests know how you feel about having them over.

(Candypants is my nickname for my sister, and Brandypants is my niece, whose real name is Brandy. It's one of those things on the incredibly long list of things that's probably only funny to me.)

In my guest bathroom, I went to the trouble of displaying a framed photo of my dear sister, taken at bathtime. Well, technically, it's a picture of my son's body with my sister's head, but still, it's a very charming photo, and I get bonus points for the fact that it's a one-of-a-kind piece of art.

And for my final decorating touch, I put another photo of my sister in a place where I could be sure it would be seen and enjoyed every day. Candypants doesn't think this is such a great picture of herself, but I figured that wouldn't be a problem since most of the time it would be to her back, anyway.

And yes, this is the kind of movie star treatment you can expect to receive when you stay at Chez Karlababble. Plus, I'll allow you to get up with my son every morning and feed him while I sleep in, which is really a treat for my guests. All I ask is that you don't all email me at once with your requests to stay at my place; regrettably, I can't house all of you at the same time. One or two guests at a time, please, and be sure to send a photo of yourself ahead of time so I can decorate accordingly.

(By the way, I've missed you!)

Think of this as an opportunity.

I know you think I'm neglecting you because I haven't posted in awhile. Now, don't jump to any hasty conclusions--I'm not in rehab. I'm not at the Mayo clinic for advanced STD testing. I have not violated my probation. I haven't hiding from the local bookie. Rather, my sister from Alaska is here for a visit.

This is the sister I refer to as Candypants. There is nothing in this world I love more than my sister. Well, except for my son. And maybe my husband. And nacho cheese Doritos. And a good long nap. And tiny little Bulldog puppies. And the letter Q. But aside from those few things, (and several dozen others), I love her more than anything. So my full attention must be devoted to her during her visit. This means I don't have much time for blogging. Depending on your outlook, this may be a blessing or a curse.

The thing I love second most in this world (I mean, after my son and my husband and nacho cheese Doritos and long naps and Bulldog puppies and the letter Q and the other unnamed things) is my niece, who is also here for a visit. So between the lovable sister and the lovable niece, I have plenty of activity in my household to prevent me from blogging.

Use this time wisely, won't you? People tend to spend too much time surfing the 'net, which erodes the brain and dulls the senses (particularly on this site). You need a break from this mind-numbing silliness, don't you? Take this opportunity to learn a new skill, experience a new adventure.

Can't think of any new adventures to expand your horizons? Choose from this handy list. You could:

-Take up knife throwing.

-Join NAMBLA.

-Sell your fresh, un-tainted urine specimens to junkies on probation. (This option is only possible for the handful of my readers who actually have untainted urine.)

-Sleep with a relative.

-Become a pole vaulter.

-Finally kick heroin once and for all.

The possibilities are endless. By the time I write my next post, you could be a whole new, more exciting, more interesting, more adventurous you! And I think we can all agree that the old you was pretty dull. So please, take this opportunity to enlarge your brain, expand your mind, without the interference of the brain-shrinking material this site is known for.

And don't worry, I'll be back very soon to destroy whatever progress you've made.

Dear Jackass, Volume 9

Dear customer who asks me for assistance and then answers his cell phone in front of me:

What is it that makes you think I'm actually going to stand here expectantly, smiling politely while you yammer away to your girlfriend or your buddy? Is it me? Do I convey such an air of patience and goodwill that you assume I thrive on serving the meaningless whims of even the most self-important pricks and thoughtless Barbie dolls like yourself? Or do I look so bored and lost and unfulfilled that surely eavesdropping on your one-sided conversation would be a big thrill for a loser like me? Don't bother answering that; go ahead, take a few more minutes and finish your conversation. I'll use this time to talk myself out of yanking your phone out of your hand and disemboweling you with it.

Dear parent who gives long-winded, unprompted speeches proclaiming, "If you mess with my kids, you'll have to deal with ME:"

Yes, fine, you win the parent of the year award, okay? Now pipe down, Supermom (or Superdad). If someone were here threatening your little sweeties right now, this monologue would be warranted, even lauded. But beating your chest and shouting your allegiance to your kids' safety and well-being while standing in line at Target or sitting in the bleachers at a soccer game wins you a classification a boring windbag. Please try limit the number of times per month you refer to yourself as a protective mama bear, or make reference to your "claws coming out" in response to a perceived threat to your babies. Save that energy for when your kids are actually in harm's way. I'd hate to hear that something bad happened to your kids while you were busy making the Mama Bear speech for the 1,365th time and weren't paying attention.

Dear people who constantly ask, "Are you working hard, or hardly working?"

I bet this little quip was novel and amusing back in 1924, the first few dozen times it was spoken. Now it's just annoying. More annoying than the tired joke itself is the dopey little chuckle you always emit immediately after saying it, in spite of the fact that you've surely used this line a thousand times in your life. Do you really still find it funny? If so, I'm stumped. I can't figure out how you got dressed this morning without getting tangled up in the leg of your pants and accidentally asphyxiating yourself.