If you tick me off, I will throw a chair at your head.

And as of tomorrow, I will know how to do that effectively... although I am not sure that a chair thrown at a persons head can be ineffective. Let's just say that I will know how to do it with some pizazz, and with a show of brute strength. Just a show though. No brute strength here. Just the strength of picking up a ten pound baby all day. Baby strength.
Tomorrow night, my husband and I will be leaving the little one with grandma and taking our awesome selves to the WWE match that will be downtown. I know. I said awesome. Paul has been following these things since he was little, sort of a family past-time, and since we have been married, I've picked up a few things while reading books when the tv is on. I will not hide the fact that I have gone from rolling my eyes with every stupid thing any of them did to yelling at the tv when certain guys come out and actually caring about who wins what matches. I still think it's ridiculous, but I've come to find that that is what makes it so fun. I am not ashamed. A little surprised with myself, perhaps... but not ashamed. And with all of the forms of entertainment out there, I suppose that this is not one of the worst you can come across.
Tonight, because they are in town, one of the wrestlers was down at the mall I used to work at signing autographs. We went to check it out, thinking there would be a few people there, but not many... the line went through the entire mall. He came out at one point to wave to those stuck at back (giving them hope that he may stay around to sign their full-size cutouts of him? perhaps.), and there were girls behind us, "OMG, who is that? I don't know, but he's hot. I'll let him sign anything he wants." Lovely. Unfortunately, we didn't have Alex with us, so we couldn't get him to sign her forehead or anything. In fact, we were not hardcore enough to stay. We left after about 2 minutes, just enough time to actually see how long the line went on for. Who knew. I had no idea that WWE was so huge still. It's like hardcore Harry Potter. Harry 'I'm gonna pound your face in' Potter.

Wish me luck.

and on a side note...

I got a haircut... with bangs. A little hesitant to jump on the bang-wagon (get it?) again, since last time I successfully shaved 10 years off my life, which put me in squarely in the pre-teen area... too young to look younger right now! But I think, with the short hair, I was able to keep my feet planted in the 20-something's. We'll see.

congratulations...

...and many blessings to Amanda and John and their newest addition!
(who, I might add, was just born yesterday and already weighs more than Alex... well done, Amanda!)

Life as you knew it has flown out the window, but I assure you it will be beautiful and wonderful in the most tiring, smelly, crazy way from here on out!

someone get me a really big pillow...

Since Sunday, my husband has been out of town on business. This could have been an awful awful time. Alex is teething right now (she already has her bottom two teeth... the ones right next to them on either side are coming in now), which makes her so very grumpy (understandably so). But, my mother-in-law came in town to rescue me. And not only that, I was lucky enough to get a visit from an old friend. So great. We've been busy the past couple of days, from strolling down the streets of historic St. Charles (think Lewis and Clarke), to visiting the Arch, to just bouncing from craft store to craft store and doing said crafts here at the homestead. The company has been so great and I am so thankful that I was not left alone with Miss Crabby Pants all week. It might have been bearable if she were sleeping through the night... but no such luck. We are still getting up at least once to eat, and usually 2-3 times other than that. I would kill for a completed REM cycle. Another luxury that I miss? Showering with the door closed. I was not prepared to give that up. But unless I wait for Paul to get home (which... let's be honest, I do quite regularly), it's open door for me.

Well, I was planning to write more, but I just started watching the Democratic National Convention, and it's getting me all fired up (in a not so positive way), and if I keep writing, I will start talking politics, and I don't want to do that. So I will stop here.

Until next time...

in other news...

my husband, who is sleeping next to me on the couch, just sat up, hit me with his pillow, and said 'that's for the richard,' then promptly began snoring again.
yes, i have crazy dreams, but his are much more fun.

i prefer silver. goes better with my skin tone.

...first, let me excuse my lack of capital letters and anything else that requires a shift key on a keyboard. along with my screen, which is completely black - we had to resort to lugging our big old dusty desktop monitor out of the back room in order to see anything we were actually doing on the computer, which, you know, can help - and my battery, which refuses to hold any charge whatsoever - and is unfortunately not under the recent 'my laptop just burst into flames' category of free replaceable batteries- my shift key has been working on and off, and well, right now it's off. so no capital letters for you. or parentheses, you may have noticed.

so, my husband and i are usually flipping through the channels at night, going back and forth with many 'what do you want to watch's and 'i don't care, whatever you want is fine's. but since the olympics started, we have pretty steadily been watching various sports at night, rooting or booing or wowing or asking each other if that would really qualify as a sport. two names have obviously stuck out - michael phelps from the good old usa, and usain bolt of jamaica. although i am sure that most of you either don't care about the olympics and therefore aren't interested in what i have to say about these men - which isn't much- or have been watching the olympics as steadily as we have been and therefore have heard way too much about both men, i am going to dish my opinions anyway. so read on if you feel like hearing more about both.

phelps- amazing. both in the pool and out. not only did he win 8 gold medals, but he broke multiple world/olympic records in doing so. i don't care if he is getting most of the news. he deserves it. i suppose he would be the babe ruth of swimming, calling his victories before actually achieving them. and once he did win, he was such a great sport about it. yes there was alot of hooting an hollering and what not - which is to be expected- , but during the race itself as well as in the interviews after, he was all about passing the credit on to other people and being very humble about it. i respect that.

bolt- amazing. i don't think any of the three records that he broke - one with the help of 3 of his teammates- will be broken anytime soon. he is, by far, one of, if not the, fastest men in the world. unlike phelps, however, in his first run for gold, which i am sure that most of you saw, when he was about half way through and well ahead of the rest of the pack, he started slowing down, beating his chest and enjoying his victory well before he actually crossed the line. i understand the excitement. you've got the whole crowd behind you, roaring their approval of your outstanding performance. but i consider it a disrespect to the rest of the men running as well as those watching to give up, for any reason, before you are done. the olympics are supposed to be the picture of sportsmanship, where men and women go and do their very best until the end - i'm thinking of the 4-women relay from the usa, who dropped the baton but picked it up and ran her heart out to the line even though they were already d-qed-. yes, his time was amazing, but what would it have been if he had run until the he crossed that line... to be fair, he ran his heart out for his other two races, and that redeemed him a bit in my eyes...

i myself have never been a child to dream about being the olympics. i am not competitive enough for that. i am on a softball team that did not win one game this season, and i am perfectly content about that. sometimes i wish i had a more of a drive when it came to sports... i feel like i would have done better in highschool if i had. but the time is past for that. i am interested, however, on how i will react when my children start playing sports... perhaps i will go all soccer-mom on them... we shall see...

I can't help but drool...

My daughter is watching a Baby Einstein movie right now, and try as I may, I cannot help but get sucked in. The lava lamps, the giraffe puppet bouncing maniacally to Beethoven's fifth symphony, the floating hand opening the little puzzle doors, and of course the toy dog that walks across the screen, flipping over every third step. Captivating. I catch myself with what I am sure is the same look that my daughter has on her face when she watches this stuff. Mouth wide open, a tiny bit of droll escaping unnoticed. I understand that these videos are supposed to promote learning in infants, but I cannot help but feel like I am slowly allowing my own and my daughter's brain cells to.... drift off to nowhereland one by one. But they allow us to have a half hour of quiet time in the afternoon... and if I have to sacrifice a few brain cells in order to get that, then so be it. Brains cells are overrated. A peaceful half hour, however, is not. Let the big colorful caterpillar continue to inch across my tv screen. I'll go make the popcorn.

The ZOO, Harry! The ZOO!

Finally, after living in this city for over a year (already!), we made it to the Zoo. I love zoos. They just bring out the happy like nothing else. And it was Alex's first time. I'm sure it has impacted her life in the greatest of great ways. I'm sure.


She was able to actually touch various animals, including guinea pigs. Which I hate. I think of them as oversized, tailless rats. And I would prefer to never have one set foot in this house. But, hey, I'm all about them being in the Zoo.

By the end of the day, she was spent. Too spent to be even semi-interested in all of the winged creatures attempting to land on her head.

Tired girl.

It was a great day, though. The weather was perfect, slightly overcast. Perhaps all the fresh air will be enough to help her sleep more than 2 hours in a row tonight... One can hope. I am starting to run into walls and answer questions that I swear my dog has asked me. And the little dreams that I do have nowadays are reaching into bits of strangeness that I had not reached yet. Did my nephew really have two heads when he was born? And if that was the case, why was it such a non-issue? "Oooooo... I forgot Logan had two heads... Silly me." I swear that is a direct quote. If only I could hook my head up to my computer and show you all what I see when I sleep... you would understand why I wake up more exhausted than when I go to sleep sometimes. ...To dream a dream... Just give me dreamless nights for a while. Dreamless, tearless nights. Ahhh... what a luxury.

..and we commence.

There are very few things in my life that are extraordinary. In fact, the beauty of it is in its ordinaryness. I have a husband who loves the hell out of me. I have a daughter, in whose presence I become a doting, wide-eyed fool who occasionally leaks from her lady-parts. I have a dog, a lady named Violet, who is quite possibly the smartest k-9 I've come across in my astounding 24 years of life. And it's all wrapped up in a nice little house in the land of the Arch.
I've recently migrated from a different website which has served me well up until this point. But now, I want a fresh start with a new setting, and, having actually made this profile quite some time ago, I figured that it was time to follow through. So here we are. To my friends and family, I am sorry for making you switch your bookmarks. This will be the last time. Maybe.

And off we go.