Stretch Life Out

So, I’m still in college and still have three children and am still married.  We still live in the same run-down house–yep, we are one of the few families that have not been foreclosed on.  Yet.  So things are pretty good.  They must be because my husband and I decided last year, without the presence of alcohol, to have another child.  Willingly.  Really, I’m not kidding.  It took a few months but I am pregnant with a fourth child and am about to burst.  I have another month to go before the true joys of parenting this child will begin.  My unborn kicks, stabs, jabs, and even complains when I am hungry; it forces me awake several times a night, and seems angry when I am stressed.  It craves pie and movie theater nachos–it has to be movie theater, and it apparently wants me to clean behind the dryer.  I can’t sleep until I do and I have to do it because everyone else will get it wrong or something.  I truly feel like a host to an alien that is sucking all energy out of me along with my wallet.  I know, pregnancy is beautiful but not when you’ve done it four times and not when it’s summer and the dog is barking and not when the air conditioner is on the fritz–it ain’t pretty.  One plus–my body has been so stretched out by the previous three kids that I do not have any new stretch marks.  That’s right, the whole point to my blog about stretch marks and making the most of it is a total bust.

I have to admit that I am excited about a new baby–the after part of pregnancy and am even looking forward to a few nighttime feedings.  That will be my only chance to be alone.  I haven’t had a kid in over ten years so some of the fears of my first-time days are creeping up like labor pain, when will it happen, and is this stuff normal?  Watching pregnancy shows does not ease my fears at all–those women are suffering and begging for relief while screaming, moaning, squeezing, and grimacing.  I for one take advantage of modern medicine and opt for the epidural because I am not stupid.  I want to be happy to see my baby and not resent him or her for punishing me–there will be plenty of time for that.  And I know ’cause this ain’t my first time at the rodeo.  I know exactly what is ahead which I think is a little more daunting then actual labor.

My unborn baby is already defiant as she kicks and squirms plenty for me, but the second my husband or one of the kids puts their hand on my belly, the baby is still and will not comply.  Naturally.  Why would one of my kids listen now?  They don’t listen later so I appreciate the heads up early from this one.  Another sign of things to come.  My kids think that having a new baby is cool and they seem legitimately excited.  My daughter though thinks my belly is weird and it freaks her out.  I lift up my shirt anyway and show her my protruding belly.  She has decided to adopt.

Dust thou understand world literature?  Dust thee do not, at least not yet.  So, I haven’t blogged in a while and as you may have guessed my college honeymoon period is over.  It’s been a long year (including a summer “vacation” with children–don’t get me started) of studying, writing, and analyzing.  Enough is enough.  And just as the honeymoon is over and I am determined to find more time to write and keep up on this blog, behold, ye olde literature comes lurking via the internet and my on-line school.  Literature requires me to read and yes, write a lot, and by very specific direction which leaves no room for the imagination or my patience.  Just to spite my instructor, I am now going off the beaten path and write what the hell I want the way I want yet with irony and mockery of my education.  Something must be sinking in, however, because I wrote an outline for this blog prior to beginning this writing journey.  I am now an official learned person and can recognize that education holds no conformity.  What?

Anywho, as I said, literature is my current subject along with accounting.  They obviously have nothing to do with the other and I think that’s funny.  What if my accounting papers start to sound like “How dust thou define debits and credits under the law of the Sabbath or from whence we came?”  Huh?  That’s a joke, but it is not too hard to believe that I easily see that happening.  I also recognize that that sentence is wordy and could have easily been summed up, but I refuse.  I also recognize that I say recognize a lot and don’t know why so I will blame that one on college.  But this is my blog damn it!  The last time I studied literature I actually liked it and remember reading it, but that was in high school when everyone had really bad hair and ironic loss of virginity despite having no taste in physical appearance.  That’s why that is ironic, duh.

So far this year I have picked up equilibriams, e-commerce, the laws of supply and demand, student protest, Nixon, the Cold War, etc., but can’t for the life of me decipher literature or why I have to decipher it at all.  I like Hawthorne and all, but we have Hollywood now–I should not have to figure out his meanings without Demi Moore!  Plot, setting, symbolism, blah, blah, blah.  I get what those things are but how can I enjoy the reading material if it gives me a migraine the size of Shakespeare’s ego?  “I must apologize for Sabbath last.”  You mean last Sunday?  Just say that!!  Most of these so called “good” writers came from a time when a public hanging was considered a social and entertaining occasion and as big as Monday night Football.  These literary so-called masters also believed in witches and spells and that birthmarks were a sign of the devil.  Why should I believe anything these writers have to say?

The answer is:  because my instructor says so.  For some mute reason these writings of great literature are important to the literary canon of society.  What?  I am majoring in business management and I would like to know how “having kept covenant by meeting thee here, it is my purpose now to return whence I came.  I have scruples touching the matter thou wot’st of” is going to help me manage a restaurant and deal with a staff that has trouble with writing down medium or medium rare.  Will I hire a better chef?  Is this how managers become bitchy?  Am I secretly being trained as an English spy or that of a weiry drone lost in an enigma wrapped in a riddle?  Huh?

As a writer I find it ironic that I am frustrated with my literature course.  Naturally, none of the literature I remember from my youth is included in the syllabus.  I meant when I was a kid, yes.  Well, I’m off to Toys R Us to beg for a job and maybe I can woo them with my exestential knowledge of symbolism for which I have a simple hand gesture to satisfy them.

Hey everyone!  I’ve been busy in college so I have more important things to do than blog, however my son has tons of time on his hands to fool around!  He would like to share with you his crazy experience concerning a museum far, far away…

How My Civil War Museum Trip Turned Out to Be

Alright, so I went onto the bus preparing to leave for my field trip and I came across the driver, which, from my point of view, looked like my 6th grade teacher.  Then I took a seat and I looked around and I saw these off-topic and off-season mini cut-out posters scattered about the walls of the bus and a picture of a U.S. army guy (who was probably her brother or something).  Then after maybe an hour and a half of driving and waiting (because we were going to Kenosha to go to this place), our bus group was finally at the Civil War Museum. 

Now when I got there, I had to hang my coat and “any other things we had along with us.”  Now, I’m thinking about that statement thinking, “Like what else are we going to have with us?  An iPod?  A stereo system?  A portable mini television [I wish!]?”  After that, we had to take a seat in a room that looked like I just walked into Majestic Cinema (a fancy movie theater in Waukesha).  Then we sit down through what seems to be a three and a half hour presentation of some-guy-I-forgot-the-name-to.  Now, there’s a table in the corner of the stage, right?  Well, he (fortunately) had the annoying tendency to lay his hand flat on the table every 25 seconds at least 30 times.  Now, at least he’s not the most paranoid human being in all of the universe and he goes like this every 5 seconds counting, “Uhhh………ummmm……”

Another thing that he would do is, well, there’s a chair in the middle of the stage, right?  Well, he will have the annoying tendency to sit on that every 5 seconds.  After two hours of that nonsense, we had to go to another museum (for some reason) just to go and eat lunch.  After that was finished, we started to head back to our original location.  Now it was time to see the mannequins and exhibits that were awaiting our arrival.  But, I got this 85 year-old tour guide (his name was Jack by the way) who tended to shake a lot whenever holding something and he seemed a little paranoid.  I turn over to my language arts teacher, Mr. Jorgensen, and told him what I noticed about him and he said to me, “It must be his age.  Probably Parkinson’s Disease.”  After the exhibits, we had to ride all around a certain area of Kenosha (because I can’t remember what specific city in Kenosha we were in at the time) inside a streetcar.  It pretty much depended on electricity and gas, but that’s probably about it.  Then, I don’t remember what happened other than the two-hour bus ride back to school.  Despite that, the trip went very well for me.  By Scott Jr. (13yrs.)

I wonder if my son learned anything–probably that old people are kind of creepy.  Those are the jokes folks, see ya’!!!

In a galaxy far, far away people wore things without sleeves.  Then someone invented sleeves.  They called it:  “a robe.”  According to Darth Vader, this was not sufficient enough.  Instead of taking over galaxies and impregnating a woman with an illegitimate child, maybe all he really needed was a “Snuggie.”  It has big sleeves and you can’t see his hands.  You can’t see his face either, but that’s beside the point.  No one realizes it, but this dark force of nature started a fashion trend that would carry on through the ages.  Obi Wan had a Snuggie, Skywalker had one, even Princess Leia followed the trend.  A really big blanket you can put your arms through.  Unless you’re a Wookiee.

It’s official.  The Snuggie has made it’s mark, which surprises me because I think it’s one of those cheesy products forced upon Americans on a daily basis that we don’t really need.  What am I going to do with a blanket with sleeves?  Apparently it “Keeps me warm and my hands free!”  Oh, I wasn’t aware that I was having so much trouble with this dilema before the Snuggie.  It’s also “Super-soft fleece!”  Um, okay.  I apparently don’t own anything “super-soft” and need serious help.  I think it’s cheap, silly, and a production of someone bored.  Also, it’s one-size-fits-all.  That can’t be good.  In adult size that could mean that a 200 lb. Wookiee can fit into the same Snuggie as a 130 lb. princess.  This does not make anyone feel good, especially me.  I need to wear a size small for my self-esteem.  A Wookiee wants to pick bugs out of my hair.  In the Millenium Falcon, that would be flattering.  In the real world, no thank you and please pass the bug spray!

My point being, I don’t want to wear some mass-produced product that can fit a man (no offense honey) or a Bigfoot.  I am a woman and need women-like things.  This is probably why “they” came up with an animal-print pattern, because it’s “sexy” or women enjoy looking like animals.  I don’t get it–this makes me not like it all the more.  I don’t dress up in over-sized cheetah blankets and I definately don’t want my husband to either.  I think it’s weird! 

So with all of this dancing around my subconscious, I went shopping last week.  They had already stapled up the Christmas decorations, even though they weren’t done selling the overstocked Halloween candy.  Then I saw it: “The Snuggie!,” stacked very neatly at the door, right next to the discount home pregnancy tests, for our convenience.  (“Holy Crap!  I might be pregnant.. again!  Oh look, a Snuggie!”)

My daughter saw the Snuggie! and she got instantly excited.  I made a face that mothers make when they’re caught off guard and are seeing something silly that their kids want for no real reason.  She was nonplussed.  She thought it was “neat” and “I should get one.”  Little did I know.

A few days passed, and my husband had to go to the store to get some batteries.  He came back with the batteries, an LED flashlight, and, you guessed it, a Snuggie!  I smiled an uncomfortable smile and giggled, reflecting back to the exchange with my daughter.  I didn’t know what to say.  Turns out, my husband had the same reaction as my daughter, only he took things a step further and actually bought one.  His reasoning, like my daughter’s, was simple: he thought it “would be cute,” and “I’m always cold.”  Thus, a ginormous Wookiee blanket was the answer.

I was touched.  It’s brown and I look like an Ewok, but I was touched.  I think it’s so sweet that he would get me something I hated in my mind.

“The Snuggie” works, to my dismay.  It is warm, but it doesn’t keep my hands free.  It’s so huge!  I need to use my “free” hands to carry it around with me when I move!  I have to roll up the sleeves twenty times just to use the bathroom–I don’t want to wear a “dripping Snuggie!”  It’s so long I could be on stilts and no one would notice.  Also, the top of it is supposed to wrap around me somehow, and I wondered “Where are the directions?”  How could a big blanket with sleeves be so complicated?  How do I make it stay around me without tripping over it at the same time?  At least I’m not cold.  Despite the size, I misjudged “The Snuggie.”  All my kids want to use it.  Just another gift from my husband to me to them.  I love it!   It didn’t hurt that my big Wookiee blanket came with a “free” book light too.  That came with directions.  My husband is currently “borrowing” it.  You see, the “Snuggie” is something for the whole family!  Thanks honey!  I got a gift, I’m warm, I can share it, and I know my husband loves “Star Wars;”  and me.

That’s right!  I said bullshit!  I have to admit that I am a paranormal junky–I watch all things ghostly, alien, foreign, disgusting, and creepy.  I have watched the same haunted house stories on the history channel, the travel channel, the sci-fi channel, and “the Shining” about as repeatedly as a lonely teenage geek on a Friday night, or Saturday night, or any night for that matter.  Sometimes there’s nothing else on, other times I am simply fascinated by the paranormal and why others are freaks just like me.  Which is why I was so interested and intrigued by the new movie “Paranormal Activity.”  How can I not spend my bank card award money on that?  It has been a must-see movie all the rave, and my husband and I were determined to “must-see” it.  That is, until we saw it.

It was Sunday night.  Sunday is pretty scary–it’s the last day of the weekend.  I’m in my glasses and pajamas (minus underwear) and am very comfortable with my boxed Merlot when my husband and I decided to escape into the paranormal.  We’ve heard nothing but rave reviews and decided to review it for ourselves with great judgement, but not until he put on underwear too.  We both put on pants and take the drive up the street to the local theatric watering hole where so many have met their demise.  Psyched and carrying an obscenely huge tub of popcorn and diet sodas, we were surprised by the full theater and decided to pick seats up close in the line of fire expecting to jump out of our seats.  Umm, that was what we were hoping.

Instead, it went more like this:  we sit down, we start snarling at our popcorn as if food is a foreign, tasty substance, we laugh at a preview, we laugh at the teenagers laughing at the preview, then without warning, two dumb twenty-somethings appear on the screen and start talking to each other incoherently.  “Um, honey?”  I say.  “Yeah, babe.”  My husband says.  “Is this the movie?”  He says, “I think so.”  Okay then, “this popcorn is delicious.”  We watch and wait like a hunter hoping for a gruesome, bloody, obnoxcious death with a dear.  Little did we know.

We hear some young woman’s squeeky voice bitch and moan at her boyfriend.  My husband does not need to pay nine dollars to appreciate this.  As a woman, even I’m rolling my eyes at her.  The young, dumb man is defending himself–when will men learn?  This goes on for a while; until bedtime.  We hear a distant noise.  It’s morning.  Repeat.  Always repeat.  The couple’s friend comes over.  She thinks the phenomenon is “weird.”  She leaves after having a bucket of wine.  What?  I said one bucket.  A psychic comes over.  He says very vague things like “this thing is following you, then?”  He’s the psychic, doesn’t he know?  Then he leaves.  This is my cue to go to the bathroom.

I sit back down and foolishly ask if I’ve missed anything.  My husband:  “No, not a thing.”  It’s night time again in the movie and a camera is placed in the couple’s bedroom.  We hear noises from outside the bedroom.  The movie is called “Paranormal Acitivity” so of course the noises can’t be a mouse, or burglar, or the house settling.  It must be an invisible goblin causing mischief in the kitchen looking for something to eat. 

Surprisingly, the noises from another room are not terrifying me the way blood spattering out of the walls for no apparent reason could.  My husband gets up to go the bathroom and to get more popcorn.  He doesn’t even bother to ask if he missed anything.  I resume eating my Dots out of boredom.  More noises happen.  Then, sheets magically lift up on their own, then a leg is lifted.  No, it’s not what you think.  We are supposed be afraid because her leg is moving and being dragged down a hallway.  By this point, the audience is determined not to be afraid at all.  We’re bored, and we’re pissed.  One hour and twenty minutes later the boyfriend is thrown into the camera and that is the only time anyone jumped.  One hour and twenty-one minutes later the movie ended. 

I couldn’t help but think of the disappointment.  I put my underwear on for this?  I want my money back.