And on my weekend, I....

My Saturday

By Liz

So.

We have to go to this thing.

For these people.

These people we don’t particularly care for.

They are friends of J’s.

Here’s the scene:

He’s a 30-something frat boy who is convinced he is NEVER wrong and, the moment his son was born and his wife stopped working, became a control freak and modeled himself after a husband from the 1950’s. We’ll call him Frat.

She’s an intellectually intelligent woman who used to have a great job in a lab. She had her son and decided to stay home to raise him. Since that moment she’s become the official family doormat - - - succumbing to her 2 year old son’s and husband’s every whim. She has no spine and CONSTANTLY apologizes for EVERYTHING. We’ll call her Doormat

Their son is a BRAT. He’s 2 and is OUT of CONTROL. He doesn’t get disciplined for ANYTHING and orders his mother around. AT 2 ! ! ! ! ! We’ll call him Brat.

So.

We were going in separate cars (us in mine and his best friend & co. in the other) with J’s best friend, best friend’s wife and their daughter leading the way.

We get there a little after 3.

Now, I find it VERY difficult to pretend I’m feeling one way when I’m feeling another. I did NOT want to go and I was NOT happy to be there. And, unfortunately, as much as I tried to put on the “happy face” it was coming through. So I started drinking some wine – which usually helps me to just not care.

Our master plan was to be out of there between 6 and 6:30.

As these people are TERRIBLE hosts, they had no finger food out for their company. NOTHING. No chips, no veggies, no cheese and crackers, NADA. Yet the husband kept demanding that everyone participate in his little “beer tasting/rating” game which included approx. 20 different beers. (This whole party, by the way, revolved around his crap-ass bar that he “proudly built himself”. Um. Yeah. Stop being so proud. It looked like crap.)

J, who has low blood sugar, NEEDED something on his stomach because he didn’t even get to finish his lunch prior to our neighbor dropping by. This man has no shame. He marched upstairs and grabbed a bag of chips and a bag of pretzels and put them out for everyone. The “hosts” seemed annoyed, but so what. There were 10+ people there and NO food in sight ! At this point the wife decides that maybe it’s time to start making “dinner” which consisted on one pan of baked ziti (which they make by substituting cheddar cheese for the mozerella because Frat doesn’t like mozerella). It wasn’t even cooking yet ! Just prepared and sitting in the fridge. So they put that on at like 5 – and it takes an hour to cook. Luckily for us, J and I were the first people at the ziti dish when it came out of the oven. I’d be surprised if there was enough for everyone there. After “dinner” Frat led everyone back to his “party room” in the basement and continued to demand that people participate in his drinking games.

O.k., dude.

Grow up.

Doormat just spent her evening going from chasing Brat and then to ignoring him all together.

At 7:30 J and I finally made our escape. Forget the bottle + of wine I’d drunk…. I STILL couldn’t get a decent buzz to make this “adventure” worth my wild. We talked smack all the way home about how maybe we should’ve have been so generous to leave the 2^nd bottle of wine behind. I mean, it was, after all, a BYOB party ! And not a very good one at that ! When we got home we just fell into bed and determined that we NEVER wanted to have to deal with them again unless we ABSOLUTELY had to.

Now.

Since we left at 7:30 and the best friend & co. were still there we got to hear the REST of the story Sunday morning.

Apparently they had to stay until their daughter’s bed time (9) so that she would crash out in the car and then stay asleep when they got home and tucked her in.

Shortly after we left Doormat and Frat put Brat to bed. Once they did that they picked up ALL of his toys and put them away – leaving their “guest child” with nothing more than the doll she brought with her. She’s a one year old ! She NEEDS toys around to keep her occupied and happy !

J and I talked about it on Sunday and he STILL wants to invite them to the housewarming.

NOTSOMUCH.

I REALLY don’t want them in my home.

#1 – the ONLY reason they’d show up at all is to scrutinize what we have or haven’t

gotten done by that time so that they could have smack to talk about us.

#2 – their child is SATAN who thinks it’s funny to walk up to cats and KICK them. I’m
sorry, but I don’t want to subject my pets to this devil spawn.

#3 – they’ll probably just show up and then want to hang around FOREVER. We are
going to have 50+ people at this thing, coming and going throughout the day. We
NEED to keep the people coming and going. We are NOT there to entertain THEM.

#4 – when they found out we’d purchased a house they IMMEDIATELY e-mailed J to
invite THEMSELVES to our house for a “keg party” and to “build a bonfire” in the
backyard. OUR backyard. You know. The WOODS?!?!? Who INVITES
themselves to someone’s house and demands it be a “keg party”?????

#5 – we are planning to have food out THROUGHOUT the day. Both appetizers as well
as entrees ! I really don’t feel like FEEDING these people all day long. I have
considerably more IMPORTANT guests coming and I’d like to have something for
them to eat.

#6 – this is not ROMPER ROOM. There will not be a place to set up a shit-load of toys
for this brat to play with (nor will I set up an area as the “changing table” for dirty
diapers). J’s best friend and wife and coming without their daughter. I think that, if
I HAVE to invite them, I will have to make this an anti-kid sort of event (for them).
I really don’t feel like having our guests walk into one of our rooms while looking at
the house and having to look at a mess or, even worse, breaking their necks on toys.
It’s one thing for J’s friend who’s a single mom. HER I’d let bring her daughter
with. THEY can find a sitter if they want to attend.

I love it….

My company sponsors a “jeans day” every so often. The employees who want to wear jeans on the designated day have to pay a minimum amount – usually $5 – and then they are allowed to wear jeans with the following stipulations: “jeans may not be torn or faded…..shorts and t-shirts are not appropriate…..clean, white sneakers may be worn”. There’s also an unsaid rule that says you cannot wear jeans that have those little silver rivets on them - - -you know, those little tabby things typically on the corners of the pockets. Try finding a pair of jeans like THAT! And when they say “white” they mean you cannot have ANY other color on your sneakers. The money you fork over, which enables you to wear your jeans that one day, goes to a charity which “they” pick (whoever “they” is I’ll never know).

Today is one of these “jean” days.
It’s “Lee National Denim Day” – a push for breast cancer awareness. That’s cool. So yesterday I hand in my 5 bucks and get my little shiny pink ribbon pin. Last night I even go shopping for a nice pink top to wear for today. Luckily I already own pristine white sneakers, so I don’t have to worry about finding a pair of THOSE. I get up this morning, put on my little “jean day” outfit and head into work. All the way in there’s a part of my brain nagging away at me asking “Are you SURE it’s today?!?!?! Are you SURE it’s even Friday?!?!?!” until I pull into the parking lot and am reassured to see that EVERYONE is in jeans.

I get settled into my desk and, after a few minutes, receive a delivery that I need to take into my boss. He asks “I was meaning to ask…is today a “dress down” day or something like that?”
Here’s where I just have to internally shake my head in disbelief.
This man is one of the HEADS of this company. And he doesn’t even know about today being a company-wide charity event.
I explained that it’s “Lee National Denim Day” and that it was to raise awareness of and donate money to breast cancer as I pointed to the shiny pink ribbon pin I’d attached to my turtleneck. Then, for shits and giggles, I threw in that October IS, after all, breast cancer month.
He just looked at me. “Breast cancer day, huh?”
“Yup !” I chirped and walked out of his office.

To add to this interaction, as I walk back to my desk ANOTHER of the guys in the area (again, a member of senior management) asks “Hey Liz, is it like a dress down/jeans day today or something?”
I was like “Yeah. Lee Denim Day? For breast cancer?”

Too much.
This is something that this company does EVERY YEAR…and there are e-mails sent out about it to EVERYONE and flyers hanging up on the bulletin boards.

Yet, they didn’t know anything about it.

You know you should seek psychiatric help when…..

Couple 'raise' Cabbage Patch doll as son

A couple from the US state of Maryland have "raised" a Cabbage Patch doll as their only son for 19 years. Pat and Joe Posey treat the 1ft doll, christened Kevin, as a human. He goes everywhere with them, they talk to him - and he "replies" through Joe putting on his voice.

The doll has his own 1,000 sq ft playroom at the couple's home, a red doll-sized Chevrolet Corvette car, a pet dog, a full wardrobe and a £2,000 savings fund for when he goes to college.

Joe and Pat love him so much they prefer him to their real child, an adult daughter named Vicky, says The Sun.

Pat said: "With every kid that you adopt, you promise to love them and be a good parent and take care of this child. And that's what we did with Kevin." She said the doll is "easy-going, quiet and well-behaved". Joe says the doll's favourite hobby is fishing, and father and son go on frequent trips to a pond near their home.

Spoiled?????

Spoiled? Who’s spoiled?!

NOT MY KITTIES !
LOL

So, the other day I realized that the bin* of dry kitty food was starting to run a little low. That and that it’s about time to do a full litter change out. So what do I do today? Trot myself out to PetsMart at lunch to go shopping for my little fuzzy brats.

A rather large “grand total” later I left the store with the following items:

7 various assorted bags of dry cat food

1 pack of cranberry urinary tract cat treats

1 pack of healthy teeth cat treats

2 trial sized packets of “weight management” wet food

1 hugundo tub of kitty litter

And last, but CERTAINLY not least…….

2 new kitty beds !

This one is for our master bedroom. Agador LIVES by the slider in there and I know how much he loves kitty beds. So I figured I’d pick it up knowing that it would “go” with the room.

The other one I couldn’t for the life of me find an exact picture of. Here’s a picture of basically what it looks like, except that he bottom of the bed is cranberry, not black. A purrrrfect color combination for the dining room. That’s where the other slider is and another of Ag’s hangouts. PLUS ! We have a place to stash the little beddieby when we have company over.

Now, with the addition of not one but 2 kitty beds I’m hoping the Peanut will get more into laying in them. The last one I got for her she turned her nose up at and it became Doodlebug’s.

So, after a full day of work today (8:30 – 5 with an hour commute each way) and getting my butt kicked by my physical therapist for an hour I get to trod home and mix dry cat food, change the stinky litter box out and get their little beds set up for the babies in the designated rooms.

No rest for the weary ! ! ! ! ! !

*For those of you who don’t know the extent of my cat psychosis I’ll explain the “bin o’ food”….my cats don’t get one kind of food. Nope. I MIX like 6-7 different types of dry food together and feed them that. “Why, oh crazy cat lady, do you do this”, you ask? Well, when I got them as kittens they were on already started on a mix of food thanks to their foster mommies. I just kept it up and here I am today. Also, I buy different types of food because then I figure I can cover all of the bases. There’s the “Healthy Urinary Tract” formula, the “Weight Management” formula (for Panya’s big fat butt), the “Indoor Cat” formula and so on and so forth…food combating everything from dental health to hairball control. Now, as you can imagine, with 6-7 different bags of food to mix I have to have one central storage area for the final product, right? HENCE THE BIN O’ FOOD !

Insane Weekend….

So.

Where to begin?

On Saturday I….

managed to finish the touch-ups in the living room. Now I just have to make J do the chair rail in there and the room can officially be considered done.

started the touch-ups in the dining room – it’s now 1/3 done. SQUEEE !

had to run to the Stop & Shop to get the ingredients for the apple pie I was making for my step-father and the stuff for the spice cake I was making for my brother. Now, the only time I’ve ever been to the Stop & Shop I got TOTALLY lost trying to get home so I made J go with so I wouldn’t end up wandering around trying to find my way back home. The pie stuff was easily enough found. BUT ! There was no spice cake cake mix in sight ! EEK !

dropped J off back at the house where he started cooking dinner. I headed out to the handy dandy Shop Rite (more like Shop Wrong, but I figured maybe on some off chance THEY’D have the spice cake cake mix). Sure enough they DID ! SQUEEE ! ! ! ! As I approached the line I realized that J’s father was in front of me ringing out. “HI GLEN !” I say to him. He obviously doesn’t hear me (or at least I’d like to THINK it was that he didn’t hear me) as he looks very focused on punching in his password on the credit card pad. So I wait a minute or two until he’s done. “HI GLEN !” I say again, but this time a little louder. He seems stunned – a deer in headlights, really. “Oh. Hi” he grumbles and then immediately asked where J was. “At home” I tell him to which he launches into a nervous little explanation of how he didn’t have our new phone number in his cell yet and so he couldn’t call first but that he’d gone by the house and no one was there. I said “Yes. Well, we went to another grocery store together.” “But the white car was at the house” he responded. “That’s because we took MY car” I shoot back. He then went on to say he’d wanted to pick up the steam cleaner he’d lent us and I told him that I wasn’t sure if it was back because J had let Mark use it when he move into our old apartment, but that I could call the house to see if he wanted. He said that he wasn’t “aware” of J lending it out and that he didn’t want to get it now because he was going to go home (the whole 2 minute drive that it was !). I was like “o.k., whatever.” When I got into the car I called Jules to tell her about the little exchange and her first response was “Why was he so nervous?!?!” “Good Question !” I thought. I got home and relayed the exchange to J who was NOT happy because apparently he’d not TOLD Glen about letting Mark use the steam cleaner and, apparently in “Glen Talk” saying “I wasn’t aware of that” means he’s pissed off. I was like “Sorry. I didn’t know I wasn’t supposed to say anything !” J then called Glen to try to do some damage control only to find that he wasn’t really ticked off but that he’s not been feeling well lately. Then, as I can hear J’s end of the conversation, it sounds like perhaps Glen had LET HIMELF INTO OUR HOUSE when no one answered the door. This alarmed me considerably. So, I asked J about it when he got off the phone. He said that Glen had NOT come into the house but did go around it and peer into the windows when no one answered the door because he wasn’t sure if anyone was home. Uh huh. I am SO not happy about that ! I’m sorry, but that’s just CREEPY ! TIME FOR ME TO MAKE THOSE CURTAINS ! ! ! ! ! ! Like, what if J and I were engaged in some “activity” and didn’t WANT to answer the door ! What? We have to worry about having Glen peeking in on us as a result?!?!?!?!? When I told mom about this on Sunday she was all scheeved out and thought that was really odd and creepy behavior from Glen.

On Sunday I…..

got up REALLY late and let J sleep in since he’d been up pretty late working on getting the Tivo, DVD player, VHS machine, etc. hooked back up to the t.v. Got a call from Glen who wanted to know the code for the garage so he could come by while we were out and pick up his steam cleaner – which I gave him though uncomfortable doing so. When J finally DID get up we didn’t have much time to do anything around the house so we just got ready to head out to Connecticut and headed out

took J to breakfast at IHOP on our way to Connecticut. VERY TASTY ! and VERY NECESSARY as having something nice and heavy in one’s stomach can be key when one knows one will be needing to drink large quantities of alcohol to get through dinner

stopped at Best Buy after breakfast to pick up birthday gifts for my brother and step-father. Matty got season 1 of Chappelle Show and I got Patrick some DVD set that had to do with the last days of WWII…it was a History Channel thing that I figured he’d dig on

Trudged to Connecticut – all 1 ½ hours of the way.

Got to Connecticut just after 3 and immediately got handed a large glass of white zin which was GREATLY appreciated. I lectured mom and Patrick on why NOT punishing Matt for totaling Patrick’s new car is a bad idea and tried my very best to convince them that he should have his driving privileges revoked – to no avail, of course, as he IS the crown prince of the family. Then THEY showed up. Thank god for the wine, that’s all I know. Now, apparently our new house is very near to one of Patrick’s niece’s house. She has cancer, has had it for years and years and years, and has never been particularly kind or cruel to me. She, like most of that family, tends to view me as non-existent (so I guess that being the case, they don’t really “view” me at all, huh?). Anyway, when mom and Patrick found out that I lived so close to her they got all excited as they thought I was “great” since I could be someone she could call if she had any problems. Uh. I think not. Why the hell am I going to help someone who acts as if I’m not part of the universe?!?!?! They’ve pretty much dropped it but I was waiting to hear one of THEM mention it. The barrage of “THEM” included Aggie, Patrick’s classy sister and, incidentally the ONLY one who acknowledges that I do, if fact, exist, Bob, her husband, Susan, one of Aggie & Bob’s daughters, Byron, Susan’s boyfriend (and, incidentally, the only man anyone’s EVER seen her with hence making us all question which team she was playing for), Nancy, another of Aggie & Bob’s daughters, Tom, her obnoxious slob of a husband, Little Asian Girl, Tom’s daughter from a previous marriage, Anna, Nancy & Tom’s 2 year old, Daniel, Nancy & Tom’s son which I never knew existed (I had no clue she’d even been pregnant again !), Mark, Patrick’s heinous son, Millie, Mark’s heinous wife, Grace, Mark & Millie’s bratty 4 year old daughter, Lily, Patrick’s freak of a sister who is the mother of the cancer-ridden niece. As soon as Lily saw me she said “hello” but didn’t bother to do what THEY do to people when they greet them which is the typical Italian kissing on the cheek. As I was talking with my brother she interrupts by loudly saying “BETH! BETH ! I hear you live near Roseanne !”

I stop my conversation with Matt to look over at her and say “That’s what I’m told.” She then launches into how that’s so great because that means Roseanne can ride in with US the next time we are coming to my mother’s house. I couldn’t help it. I gave her a dirty look and responded with a “Yeah. Um. Maybe.” After this point she obviously had no more use for me as she didn’t approach or speak to me for the remainder of the evening. BITCH. What the hell?! You’re going to be ugly for years and years and years and then the second I can be of service to YOU you deem me worth talking to. FUCK YOU. All in all, I pretty much got PLASTERED throughout the remainder of the evening…taking out 1 ½ - 2 bottles of wine. By dinner time I was full swing into my southern drawl (which I manage to mask on a daily basis and which only really comes out when I’ve had one too many) and J made sure to point it out to me. I think I may have gotten a little “loud” with my laughter a time or two but you know what? FUCK ‘EM ! I was at the kiddy table (as per usual) and had the audience of kids, my brother, his two friends and J. I did NOT care. I was at MY mother’s house and I DO exist there ! SCREW ‘EM ! We made our escape around 8:30 and I managed to not pass out the entire way home (I’m SO proud !) I do remember, however, that the trip home included me singing along to the Macy Gray album J had put into the CD player and me crying for that little Asian girl…because I saw me in her. I saw how they treated her – the same as they’ve always treated me…and it made me SO sad for her. She, like me, has done NOTHING to these people to deserve this treatment. She is a LITTLE GIRL who did not ASK to be born and did NOT ask her daddy to knock up his girlfriend and then marry her ! The whole thing just made me really sad. And J had to listen to that and then me babbling about how much I don’t like “THEM” and how, though they treat me badly, that I feel obligated on occasions such as these since it is, after all, for someone I’m ACTUALLY related to. I collapsed into bed as soon as we got back and woke up fresh as a daisy at 6 this morning (yeah, ya’ll can hate my guts right about now because I DON’T get hangovers ! ! ! ! BLAH HA HA HA HA ! ! ! ! !)

And that, my dears, was how MY weekend was !