My Maniacal Misfit Menagerie

Today, I learned the true definition of love. Not that Romeo and Juliet crap my daughter has recently tried selling us all on. I'm talking hard-core, unconditional love. You know, like the kind a mother has for her child. You may recall I told you my youngest was going to be playing Pop Warner football in the fall? Well starting in August he begins strength and conditioning. In his previous sporting endeavors, he's been more interested in the playing side than the practice and drill sessions. My older son is the opposite; complaining if he doesn't get a balance of play time and practice/coaching time. In an effort to try and make this sport work for him, I've come to realize that he will need to be comfortable with the sheer physicality that will be required for him to get through August. So today, I started training with him. Actually, training may be an overly generous term for our sessions. Having no real idea what his "strength and conditioning" might act

So I'm back to my all time favorite task since starting this blog: researching what I'm doing. Throughout my studies one fact becomes glaringly more obvious with every article I read. I have created a Seinfeld blog. That's right. A blog about nothing. Nothing I tell you. All of the information out there tells you how to promote your business through your blog. I have no business. My blog is simply to entertain you all. I'm like a bard. Or perhaps more accurately, a court jester. I'm not trying to promote my fortune 500 company or show off a new product we've just developed here at headquarters. I'm certainly not trying to educate anyone. In fact, I'd like to add a disclaimer here that if you have learned anything, it was purely accidental and not intended. Furthermore, it might be best if you attempt to unlearn anything you accidentally did learn in the reading of said non educational posts. These professionals suggest informative graphics, guest speake

I knew what kind of day it was going to be at 4 o'clock this morning. Winnie had just crawled back into bed with us and began her routine of getting as close as possible. Just as I noticed a certain odor, a wet paw stepped on my face. Because apparently, some days you step in shit, some days it steps on you. So at 4 o'clock in the morning, I'm in the bathroom giving an angry cat a bath. Ever give a cat a bath? I recommend it at least once before you die. Everyone believes the propaganda that cats have 4 legs. Little known fact: cats are gremlins. That's right. Watch what happens next time you get one wet. First of all, they sprout way more than 4 legs. Each tiny precious kitten foot sheds its retractable nail and is replaced with razor blades. The time/space continuum loses its fluidity; allowing the cat to be simultaneously attacking your arm, wrapped around your face, and half way down your shirt all at the same time. The darling animal you've invited into your ho

For those of you who follow regularly, you'll be surprised to discover that this post is about Winnie. I know, I know; I hardly ever talk about her. It seems oddly fitting that the member of the family who seems to require the most attention daily should develop her own online following. This blog was never meant to be about her daily antics, and yet it seems to be evolving that way, with other random posts thrown in for good measure. So as previously stated in other posts, Winnie likes to watch the hummingbirds. And she thinks she's a husky. And she likes to spend many of her waking hours at my side. So I suppose we really all should have seen this coming. With the nice weather, I've been trying to spend as much time as humanly possible outside. Since my vitamin D levels are always so low, I like to say it's doctor ordered. "Sorry, I want to clean the house today, but it's nice out. I should hang out on the patio and sunbathe. Doctor's orders." "

I suppose sooner or later it would come out that I am mildly obsessed with hummingbirds. An impartial observer may say that my obsession is a little bit more than "mild" but we just won't conduct any polls on the matter. I will say that one of our family trips a couple of years ago involved flying out to Arizona for a hummingbird festival. I even got to cross an item off my bucket list - hold a hummingbird in the palm of my hand. I still say that doesn't make me obsessed. It just makes me passionate. Ooh, wait. Interesting. It makes me interesting! This really all started when I was much younger. Before I had ever even seen an actual hummingbird. I have no idea how it all began. I just remember being fascinated by their diminutive size and their unique flight patterns. By the time I hit my mid twenties, I had experienced an occasional sighting here and there. I vowed if I ever had my own home, I would make it a hummingbird mecca. Think "if you build it, they

I can finally share a story I've been sitting on for a little over a week. After all, it wouldn't be fair to share it here when I wasn't even telling my kids about it. Some of you may have figured out through these posts or my near constant story telling/picture sharing that I am unreasonably attached to Winnie, our 5 month old kitten (Or, as she was referred to today as, our 26 week old kitten). How can I not be? She never really leaves my side. She often comes running up to me purring excitedly as if it hasn't been a mere 10 minutes since we saw each other last. Pretty sure she likes me more than my husband likes me (to be fair, she hasn't known me nearly as long). So at her vet check up a little over a week ago when the vet heard a murmur and suggested an echocardiogram "just to be safe" I tried to react like a normal human being. I missed normal by a good thousand miles, but I tried. First, I questioned about specific (benign) cardiac abnormalities, pr

Last night was a baseball game night. I want to start by saying that my sons have had the good fortune of having some great coaches. People that love the game, the kids, and volunteer from the heart. I have always been thankful for these people who have been part of the village that has helped us raise them. We all know there's those "other" coaches out there, though. Yesterday, we ran into one. I want to be fair and submit the following disclaimer: I know nothing about this man, his life, or any coaching techniques aside from what I witnessed last night. That being said, he really didn't shine too brightly during that time. My children will be the first to tell you that it is exceedingly difficult for me to watch a professional game quietly. Thankfully, most of these are seen from the relative obscurity of my livingroom. That does not dissuade me in the least from coaching loudly and occasionally inappropriately. (It took Wolf almost an entire football season to sto

As I listen to the dulcet sounds of my husband snoring next to me, that sleep number bed commercial keeps playing in my mind. Have you seen this gem? The happy couple gets into bed and he immediately starts snoring. She reaches over to her nightstand, grabs a remote control and gently raises the head of his bed. Like magic, the bastard stops snoring. Moments later, when she also begins to snore, he does the same. I need this bed and its magic remote. But you see, I've been listening to this cacophony a little too long now. I want the deluxe remote. I think you know what I'm talking about. Not the remote that gently lifts the head of the bed. That simply won't be enough here. What I want is the one that catapults him from the bed and flings him across the room. After listening to this for hours, it seems like a satisfying thump from his body hitting the wall is what's really called for here. To be fair, he has bought a variety of stupid gimmicks in the past to try

Yesterday I went for an eye exam at my local Lens Crafters. I now remember one of the reasons why I haven't been in years. We got there early to fill out paperwork. Luckily, we were early enough to hold the seats in the waiting room down for awhile as well. Fast forward to actually meeting with the doctor. I understand not everyone has a keen sense of humor, but this doctor was special. She started by asking what brought me in. I explained that I was having increased difficulty seeing distances as I was driving and I was having problems reading tiny print. She ingratiated herself to me by reminding me that "once you pass the age of 40, your vision starts to age as well." Now, I know this. Everybody knows this. The issue is, I like the idea of seeing. The appointment continued. She did all the typical eye doctor shenanigans, then concluded with the image killer: you could benefit from bifocals. I can wander around all day long without glasses and I haven't bumped into

I know you all are suffering from withdrawal after not having heard from me in DAYS! But there's a couple of reasons. First, and foremost, I've been wrestling with a major ongoing case of drag-ass. What's drag-ass you ask? Surely you jest! That's when your ass is dragging throughout the day and there is no energy for even the simplest things. Its when moving feels as if you have lead weights attached to your limbs and you're running through water. There's also a mental fatigue that usually accompanies it. A brain fog if you will. Imagine if you knew nothing about advanced theoretical physics. I know, this is going to be a stretch for some of you because honestly, EVERYONE knows advanced theoretical physics. But just pretend with me for a minute. What if someone said in a week you needed to take an 82 page exam and get a score of no less than a 97.2% or you would die? You'd study pretty hard. All night and all day. I mean, you can sleep after, right? At the e

Today I want to bitch about one of the newest fads my children have taken to like medieval leeches to a person with "the vapors". Spinners. Have you seen these things? They're fantastic. They're marketed under the guise of stress reducing tools. Nay, nay my friends. I don't know what they do for the stress level of the person spinning them, but let me assure you, they can ratchet my anxiety right through the roof. A couple of spins of those things in my car and I develop a nervous tic. Clearly these were invented, not by some well meaning person who works with people suffering from anxiety/ADHD. No. This was invented by someone who hates parents. Possibly teachers. I can't imagine they're too thrilled with these fantastic do hickies either. One of my sons mentioned they were banned in his school. The other one followed it up with "yeah, that's because someone used it like brass knuckles to hit another student." Gee. And for that they bann

This post is actually being written at the request of my coworkers. Plural. More than one asked last night. You'll need a little background to understand, but they assured me that my misery should not be self contained; but rather, placed out into the world for all to enjoy. I'm a special care nursery nurse. I take care of premature and sick babies. Last night my patient assignment consisted of 2 babies. They had feeding tubes in place and would only be attempting to eat by bottle 1 time each for my entire shift. It should have been an easy night. Of course, it wasn't. You see, I've also been dubbed the human laxative. Last night I was having a particularly productive night, much to the unending delight of my loving and supportive colleagues. In an effort to try and promote growth, especially for our most fragile patients, we try to let the infants sleep, only waking them for care time. That's when we do our assessments, vital signs, feedings, changes,  etc. We try

Well, okay. Maybe not an ode. That suggests insightful poetry or epic story telling. This is not the place where you'll find that kind of writing. Let's set our sights a little lower. This will be more of an homage. Regardless, I'm not sure how I survived in the pre-Amazon days. I love being able to shop from home. Kids come home with an obscure book they need by the end of the week? Amazon. I know exactly what kind of sheets I want but I most certainly do NOT want to look all over America for them? Amazon. Bra shopping? I'd rather rub shit through my hair. My good friends at Amazon realize this. They even take the time to get to know me. "Based on your previous purchases, we think you might like the following items: ..." I do! I do like those items! Wait a minute. Aren't you linked up to my bank account? Oh Amazon. I'm pretty sure we both know I won't be purchasing any of those suggested items today. Let's create a wish list and call it "

I'm currently at the little league field here in town. Otherwise known as my spring home-away-from-home. My oldest son has been playing baseball for...a long time now. I've lost track of exactly how long. He took a brief hiatus, but I think he regretted it about a week into the season. Since then, we've been here steadily. My youngest did baseball for a couple of years as well. It didn't take long, though, for him to decide that his real passion was soccer. Until is wasn't. I now have until the end of this week to sign him up for pop Warner football. Last fall my husband was waiting for our takeout order to be ready when he struck up a conversation with a member of the New England Patriots. His parting advice was to have "the soccer player switch to football." Who can say whether or not that had any bearing on his decision. But I digress. I love baseball. Always have. These fields, however, sit in the middle of the Bermuda triangle. If it is 80 degrees in

Remember that old Eddie Rabbitt song I Love a Rainy Night? God I loved that song because I absolutely agreed with him. What better way to fall asleep than to listen to rain falling on the roof with thunder in the background. There's nothing like a good storm to cleanse the soul. Except, I hate the rain now. I can feel it before it even gets here. All of my muscles start to stiffen. I begin to feel like I'm 90 years old hobbling around doing a poor penguin impression. The other night at work was the worst. We were half way through a biblical flood and I arrived feeling less than fantastic. By the time I was a couple of hours in, I thought I might become a patient myself. Sharp shooting pain was radiating from both sides of my spine down my butt and into my thighs. My hips felt like I had rocks in them. The skin around my upper arms, collar bone and chest felt like it was on fire. My feet felt like I had been running around in narrow heels 4 sizes too small for me. Let's no

I swear I'm having a Sean Spicer kind of day. I don't often draw parallels to him (actually, I've NEVER found common ground with him). But this whole password fetish in America is getting out of hand. I'm happy if I remember to eat lunch. Now everywhere I go wants a password. This one wants a certain set of requirements. This site here has different password criteria. Too long. Too short. You need a capitol letter. No, not that one. Try again. That password is already taken. You need a symbol. No, there's no middle finger emojis allowed as your symbol. Don't use birthdays, pet names, star constellation cordinations, or anything else you might reasonably have a chance of remembering. By the time you find a bloody password that is acceptable, you've long since forgotten what your last attempt was! There's something to be said for live tweeting your passwords in the hopes that someone, somewhere can access your freaking Snapchat account! Even if I remember

We got Winnie shortly after we lost our cat Larkspur. He was a lovebug and rarely got into things he shouldn't. Winnie is not cut from the same cloth. After posting about our loss on Facebook, a friend suggested Winnie might be perfect for us. I was reluctant, because it was far sooner than I was ready for. But it turned out to be just what I needed. I sometimes refer to her as my therapy cat. Not because she's well behaved, you understand, but because she is a great distraction. She is my shadow. Even now as I write this, she is at my side to "help". In the beginning, she was still in her tiny-kitten-sleeps-all-day stage. Coincidentally, I was going through yet another med change which left me inclined to sleep all day as well. We were soulmates. Because of my fibro and a side order of Reynaud's, I am always cold. Always. Even in California in August. Since Winnie has no body fat, she is constantly looking to snuggle, especially under the covers. As such, I br

Just over a year ago, my husband took me to New Orleans for a surprise anniversary trip. I had never been and we were only going for the weekend, so I decided that we would need to average about 46.279 tourist stops a day to cram in a small portion of what I wanted to do down there. It was Friday night, so I figured Bourbon Street would be a great place to hang out. Saturday morning I wanted to wake up early and try this charming cafe that sold beignets. We got off the plane, checked into our hotel, and my downward spiral began. I felt like someone had attached a vacuum to me and sucked out all of my energy. Just moving was an almost insurmountable task. To be fair, I work nights, so I assumed I was just a little "off". No big deal. Bourbon Street would still be there tomorrow. We didn't wake up quite as early as I planned, but we still made it for my beignets. Holy moly. Well worth the trip! We managed to do a couple of things here and there, but not nearly as much as I

So we live in this beautiful home built in the 1830's. I say beautiful. My husband seems to be more inclined to draw parallels to the Tom Hanks movie The Money Pit. We live in sunny Massachusetts where the weather is as fickle as a woman in a shoe store. And then there's the snow. Ugh!! 2 years ago it snowed 4,286 feet over the course of, I believe, 2 weeks. While I thought the sight of pristine snow falling on the woods behind us was becoming a little monotonous, I soon came to understand that rain falling in my kitchen was a far less pleasing site. But hey, we had always talked about doing the kitchen someday. I was thinking in the way far away future. Like when I could reasonably expect my cyborg houseboy Q4HN to take care of it. But now that the good people of the disaster company had already removed the wall boards and such, I, uh, suppose this is as good a time as any. Right? I work nights. What that translates to for the rest of the world is "since you're ho

So let me introduce some of the people who are sure to find their way into these stories, whether they want to or not. After all, isn't that what family is for? The husband and I have been married for (hang on, gotta do the math...shh, don't tell him. You and I will have lots of secrets here on this wildly public site) 15 years. We've been together for over 18 years though. While I am ever so slightly impulsive and marginally irrational, he is wired completely differently. Probably a good thing. He'd lead a boring life without me. Don't worry; you can share that fact with him. He already knows. He and my oldest son will probably end up as my technological consultants. If there's something about the computer they don't know, it isn't worth knowing. My husband can rip a computer's guts out and stitch them back together. He's pretty good at recovering lost files, linking networks together and a wide variety of other things I barely even

A friend recently said to me, "Ya know, I was thinking of you the other night. If this whole nursing thing doesn't work out for you, you should start a blog." First of all, I can't help but laugh that ten years later I'm still getting the "If the nursing thing doesn't work out..." At what point can we say it has or hasn't? For Christ's sake, I'd rather wait out retirement at this age than retrain for another damn career! And frankly, I love nursing. But she got me to thinking. Usually that statement is followed with "you could be a stand-up comedian." Yeah...not likely. First of all, I'm more of a sit down kind of girl. I've got three kids (four with the husband), a dog, a brand-new kitten, and a chinchilla. Yeah, a chinchilla. Because what self-respecting American household DOESN'T have a chinchilla? Secondly, there's a lot of effort in stand-up comedy. The writing, the booking, the delivery, the in