A Clarification

Okay...now it's the "morning after" our big girl's night. I always have the giggles after a night out. My brother was concerned that I drove a car last night and he said, "Hey maniac, did you drive home last night?"
"Of course not! Are you out of your mind?" I replied.
"Well, you wrote on your blog 'Hey everyone...I've had a few drinks and I'm drinkin' and driving...'"
By now I was cackling into the phone.
"Matt! I use "driving behind the wheel" as a metaphor for writing on my blog which is CALLED A Squeaky Wheel."
So...here I am at my brother's house, head pounding, only to learn that their DAMN COFFEE POT IS BROKEN!!! Oh The Humanity!!!

Heather and I would like to know why Jen Peust MADE US PARTY on a Wednesday night, and why we HAD to have an IRISH COFFEE before we TOOK A CAB home.

Also, for the record, in all seriousness, I NEVER drink and drive. I am a terrible driver, and I probably should take a cab every where I go, day or night.

HAVE A GREAT DAY...I'm off to find an IV feed of coffee.

Irish Wake

Goood Evvvvening! I had the good fortune to go out with my favorite Annapolitans this evening - my sisters in law, Bevin and Heather, Jen Pesut, Alana and Lauren. Very fun. Lovely, lovely ladies every one. LUCKY ME!!!

After dinner, Jen insisted that a few of us keep the party going. Heather and I obliged, and headed on down West Street to the Purple Tooth. We could tell from a distance that it was closed, so we kept on heading east towards Church Circle. When we got to the Lowes Hotel, Jen and I sighed and said, "This is where Holly's wedding reception was...let's go in and drink." What else could we do? When Holly's name comes up, we sink into a deep depression, we call our friends, and we try our best to medicate our pain over losing her.

Once inside the bar, we ordered some drinks, and set to talking about Holly. Dear, sweet sister-in-law Heather was a wonderful audience for our stories and tears. I'd say that we talked about Holly, and her fight for life, and and her wonderful, happy mischivous ways for a good hour. Jen and I were crying...we were missing Holly so much, and wishing just to have her near us.

Every time that we navy girls get together, we end up taking about and crying about Holly. MIke and I grieve often over our loss, and we have a daughter named after her!!! I'm not sad about my grief...I appreciate each tear. I've got a lifetime of tears to shed over Holly Jean Fitzpatrick. I've got friends to laugh with along the way. We are going to be okay.

We miss you so much, Holly!

Take A Picture (It'll Last Longer)

Chris McAnnally posted a "back in the day" photo of me on Facebook. I got a message that Maco had "tagged"me in a photo, and immediately I thought, "Oh, no..." because Maco is a friend of Mike's and mine from BC and Flight School. Millions of misdeeds played out in my mind: late nights in the Mods at BC (the crazy student housing where we lived), or even worse, late nights at McGuire's Irish Pub in Pensacola, where we would drink green Irish Wakes by the gallon, and sing with an Irish band long into the night. But when I clicked on the photo, I was strangely put at ease. It was me on a beach towel, in a pink bikini. I was sitting with Potzo (Matt Pothier) who was drinking a beer. We were at Pensacola Beach on the 4th of July, watching the Blue Angels. Mike was there, but for some reason was not in the photo. In the photo, I'm not whooping it up, or goofing off...I'm just very happy and enjoying a day at the world's best beach with some wonderful people.

Now, you might imagine that I would be horrified at seeing 22 year old Jennie in a bikini. It's possible that some women at my age and in my "haggard housewife" stage of life, raising babies and trying to make it in the world as adults, might look at that photo and say "What hapened to me?" But that's not how I felt at all. As a matter of fact, my first reaction to seeing that photo was, "Look at me!" and then, after studying my smile, the satisfied, easy-going look on my face, the tan on my shoulders, and the company in the photo, I thought, "I AM EXACTLY THE SAME." I still love to smile, chill out with my friends (and DO NOTHING!!! see two posts ago...). I feel very, very thankful for the wonderful people that I know and friends that I keep close to my heart (including all of those flight school bubbas, and now their wives and children), and there aren't many things that can compare watching The Blues tear up the sky on a sunny day. So, I guess the only thing that's different in the photo is that I've got a new bathing suit, I've gained some laugh lines, (and other battle scars from raising and HAVING children) and I wear a wedding ring. (That was something that I noticed in the photo too. Mike and I have been married for almost 14 years, and I've never taken my wedding ring off...so it was funny to see my hand without it!) I love looking back, and I love looking forward, and I mostly love right NOW.

I'm off to throw pancakes at my kids. Have a great day!

Thought for the Day

Courtesy of my BC roommate Greer Wasso Hanson.  LOVE IT GREER!!!

Whatever you give a woman, she will make greater. If you give her sperm, she'll give you a baby. If you give her a house, she'll give you a home. If you give her groceries, she'll give you a meal. If you give her a smile, she'll give you her heart. She multiplies and enlarges what is given to her. So, if you give her any crap, be ready to receive a ton of shit.'

Luxury Items

Well, yes - I think the economy is making each of us tired.  Tightening the belt is no fun at all.  I am sporting what I call my "recession hair"...it's a hefty chunk of change to get this thick mop colored...so I am (sigh...) a brunette until I hit the pool and chlorinate it.  It always comes back in the summer anyway!!!  Oohhhh...maybe it will become tax return hair!   I high(light)ly doubt it!  For now, gone are date nights of a few glasses of wine, a meal, and a babysitter to boot.  It's just too damn expensive to do that like we used to.  Luckily, Mike and I enjoy time together enough to exchange dates "out" for dates "in."  We love meeting up on the couch for a few rounds of head to head Ms. Pac Man...or to watch our television that we hardly EVER watch.  (The tv 'seasons' where they stop making the shows for a while have no meaning to us.  We are really out of it!  We do like laughing at funny television together though, and I have a complete library of Gray's Anatomy to catch up on...ONE DAY.)  We enjoy the fancy wines less and less, and opt to toast life with some frosty, yummy Coors Lights.  YUM!!!  COORS LIGHT!!!!  YAY!!!  Times are hard and things are expensive, but giving up a cut-and-highlight or a few overpriced glasses of wine is just the way it is these days. 

I have some real luxuries here at the house that are truly priceless to me, and that I get to enjoy on a near daily basis.  One is coffee.  I LOVE my morning cup of coffee.  I don't buzz up on caffeine all day, but that first morning cup - that very first sip(!) that is so wonderful.  Here is the best part...if Mr. Wonderful is here...he brings it to me, IN BED.  That's right.  I get a cup of coffee brought to me in bed to wake me up.  It's Mike's little gift to me each day, and I love it.  I try very hard to reciprocate.  I cook as often as I can for Mike.  Think about the food that you eat on airplanes:  that's what Mike has to eat when he isn't home.  So, these are the luxuries: we wait on one another, and we think of one another.  Money can't buy consideration.

Here's another luxury, and this one will seem freaky and weird...it's ZAZZ!!!  Yes, Matt, ZAZZ!  What is Zazz, you ask?  It's bubble water!  Seltzer!  It's sugar free, chemical free, and it tastes so good.  I have never been a soda drinker, or a juice drinker, so most of the hydration in my life has come from the tap.  (Faucet or Keg, depending on the time of day.)  My brother got me hooked on ZAZZ, and when he talks about it, he uses this very effeminate voice and "jazz hands" - so I also laugh whenever I say the name, or "psssst" open a can.  ZAZZ!!!  More luxuries!  A yummy drink, having my family around me, and HUMOR.  All free...or at least darned cheap.

And a final luxury that I've been wanting to write about for a long time is about something that I call "luxuriating with my kids."  You might think that as a SAHM (stay at home mom) that I have a ton of time to play, coo, color, frost brownies, all of that...but I don't.  I run this ship largely on my own, and there is very little - there's practically no - down time.   In addition to my duties in running the house, there are many things going on in the Big Girls' classrooms, and at school.  My girls also have homework now, too.  And of course there are phone calls to answer, appointments to make and keep, emails to check and return.  We eat as a family every night, and I demand that everyone has clean underwear, so I do try to keep up with the laundry (that last one was a joke!)...these things take time, but they are WORTH it, and many of them are fun.  I am around my kids alot, and we are doing "things" together...but my favorite thing is to LUXURIATE and do absolutely nothing with them.  Oh, how I love to unplug, shut down, hang up, and just sit on the floor in a room with them.  They have so much to say and share...and I have so much to learn by just watching, listening, and participating as I am invited. How often are we modern families together without an agenda?  I am so glad that I can luxuriate whenever I want.  You know, I could (well, not now...) take a break for myself for a pedicure, and hire a sitter so that I could go.  While there, I would look at my watch, and wonder about what every one was doing.  Then I would look at my watch and think, "Oh no!  My 'time to myself' is almost over!"  They I would hurridely take the 'alone' time to clean out my text messages, or check my voice mails frantically...and I will do those things one day soon. I like pedicures!  But a true luxurious break, for me, is to have no plan; to not be the boss, and to just hang out together...in their world, with their rules.  Caroline calls it "Chillaxin'"..chillin' and relaxin'...I call it a luxury bought with time, and I'm real happy to have that.

Check out this sign that Charlie made while we were hanging out.    The thing that looks like an upside-down tooth at the bottom of the page is actually a heart.  He taped it to the wall next to Mike's side of the bed.  Love you too, little dude.

WWMD - What Would Mike Do?

So, I've been on the blog long enough now for you to know that I'm kind lame about some things.  I don't like to have tons of "stuff" - don't know why.  We do not own a Wii.  I don't know when we would play it.  If we are in the house, it is usually to watch a sporting event, eat, sleep, or socialize.  BUT, we do have an old Sony Play Station that Mike used to take on deployment.  Mike has recently dusted it off, and he found some used Games From the 80's at a local gaming store.  We've been having a ball playing Ms. Pac-Man after the kids are in bed.

HOWEVER...this was not a scene that I expected to walk in on when I came back from a chilly run the other day.  The big girls were at school, the littles were napping, and MIKE WAS PLAYING VIDEO GAMES.  Breathless, I snuck up behind him with the camera and yelled, "ARE YOU KIDDING ME?"  

Apparently, Mike's need to play the Lego/Star Wars game that we bought for the kids was completely my fault.  In turning off the game one day, I "erased" all of the "levels" that Charlie (MIKE) had passed.  Mike now needed to play the game BY HIMSELF to get 5 year old CHARLIE back up to the level of greatness that I had inadvertently erased.  

He took a quick break to make himself a peanut butter sandwich, and have a glass of milk.  Of course he did.

Whole Fool

I am done with Whole Foods.  They suck.  Kelly Dowd is done with them and I am too.  Here's why I am not going there any more, despite the fact that I am a freaky-organic:

1.  Giant and Trader Joes are more fun, cheaper, and the employees are nicer. 

2.  WFM is an elitist market.  In New Orleans, they were these kind of cool, crunchy stores...but here...eeww. It's as expensive as all get out - it's not friendly - and it's crowded.  

3.  There's nothing particularly local about our Whole Foods.  There was in New Orleans.  I did love the WFM uptown in New Orleans.  You could order a dark chocolate mocha at the coffee bar then do your shopping.  I would literally skip down the aisles at 8 AM, Charlie in the basket, HJ in my tummy, caffeine pumping through my veins.

4.  I tried to return something to the Annapolis store today, that I bought BY ACCIDENT (with four children in a grocery store sometimes you end up buying things by accident!), and they wouldn't take it back because I didn't have an effing receipt!  (When I got home, I called the manager and told her that I was going to print up a pie chart of how much money I had spent in her store over the past two years as it relates to the earnings of our family...she agreed to give me a refund.)

So that's it!  I am not shopping at the Whole Foods until the Bigger and Better one opens this summer, and then, and only then, I will shop there for just deli stuff in a wig and sunglasses.

Ahhh the musings of a stay at home mom.

Here are two things that have been really funny to me lately:

1.  A friend said that hearing the words "Stimulus Package" reminds him of a title of a porno flick.

2.  Another friend said that she has been paying her bills for three days and now "hates everyone."

I am laughing as always...hope you are too.  Nighty night!