momsaidwhat

I’m just going to put my bias out there before I pull out my soapbox this morning.  Make no mistakes, I am a disgruntled, non-playoff making, die hard Steelers fan who spent far too many Sundays this season watching horrendous football on both sides of the ball.  We were not a playoff caliber NFL football franchise by any stretch of the imagination, and should spend the entire off-season wearing ass hats to display publicly our shame.

In this town being sidelined in the post-season is a bitter, bitter pill to swallow, and I’ve just not quite reached a place of acceptance concerning our parade of mediocre performances, botched opportunities, and not-getting-the job-done-ness to watch the NFL post-season without fits of anger and uncontrolled outbursts.

A glutton for punishment, I spent a considerable amount of time this weekend shouting profanities at the television as I watched teams I loathe triumph in the wild-card games.

Yes, Baltimore Ravens, I’m talking about you.

You expletives. 

I hate you.

As if it weren’t sickening enough to watch the expletives in purple trounce the Colts, watching Ray Lewis’s post-game remarks made me puke in my mouth.  Though I will eat a heaping helping of crow and acknowledge that this expletive is truly an animal on the football field (and off), and is unarguably one of the greats to have ever played the game; it makes me sick to cast this douchebag as an American hero or an ambassador to the game.

Exhibit A

Ray Lewis, penance happens offstage, with no audience, no crowds, no media, and without fanfare.  To see you conveniently strip off your game jersey and display your Psalms 91 t-shirt for the world to see made you an even bigger fraud in my eyes.

Color me crazy, but I think God had a few other items on his to-do list that trump your performance against the Colts, though he thanks you for your contrived praise and glory for the sake of your rehabilitated image.

God is a Steelers fan, Ray Lewis…and the Ravens are a franchise not even Jesus can love.

There.

I feel better.

Go Broncos.

Mr. Wonderful at his wonderful-est

I remember as a kid, heading to McClellan Elementary School on Election Day with my parents.  The polling precinct was alive with a mix of excitement and nerves, palpable to a little kid who new little about the candidates or the issues.  As I walked past the dozens of red, white, and blue signs, collecting leaflets from pollsters like Halloween candy, I knew in my tiny gut, voting was a big deal.

My parents, the Captain and Mr. Wonderful, always took us behind the curtain of the voting booth; it made me think of the Great and Powerful Wizard of Oz.  Now I know it’s far bigger than that.

We pulled the levers for our parents’ candidates: my brother, the favorite, got to pull the lever for president; I chose the unopposed candidate for Auditor General or the local librarian; Mindy was left at home with the family of wolves that raised her.

The Captain and Mr. Wonderful respected Election Day as a national holiday, today I did the same for my son.  We dressed in red, white, and blue and bid a heartfelt good morning to all who exercised this tremendous freedom we hold as Americans.  I spoke to him about how important this day was to all of us, and how his grandfathers, his father, and so many other brave Americans served and sacrificed so that we could cast our vote today.

I know on his two-year-old  level, he understood.

Jeffrey pushed the buttons today.  I hope you all do the same.

Thank you, God, for allowing us to live in this amazing country.  I’ll take America on a bad day over any other place in the world.

In honor of all of the brave men and women who have served, and continue to serve our great nation, please, please vote.

I think I might be one of those people who goes on in conversation past the point where my audience loses interest…and then beats a dead horse…and then runs it into the ground.

No one wants to be that person.

More than that, no one wants to bump into that person.

I am that person.

Listen, I’m used to my own family cutting me off with flimsy excuses.  In the past week alone, the Captain has cut me off in the following abrupt ways:

• “I gotta run.  I’m REEEEEEAL busy.”
• “Molly, this is your brother calling.  I have to take this.”
• “I’m getting in the shower.  If you don’t have anything new; I’ll talk to you tomorrow.”
• “Here’s your Dad.” (Followed by an extended pause indicating Dad has no desire to talk to me whatsoever)
• “I’m on the other line with your sister.  Let me call you back.”  Still waiting.  Still waiting.  Still waiting.”

It’s a whole different show when someone who isn’t blood takes a pretend call to get you to give it a rest.

That was me this morning.

I cornered this poor guy from work who recently had his first child.  Initially he was happy to share a few tender tidbits of his first weeks of parenthood; he’d have been even happier if the conversation ended there.

Clearly he doesn’t know me.  I was just getting warmed up.

I continued to beat his ear with and endless stream of personal, parental wisdom and funny kid stories; until he politely put his headphones on and started to backpedal away.

Hint taken.

If you joined me yesterday, you are aware of the Halloween trauma that I inflicted upon my my 2-year-old son Jeffrey.  I am certain that judging by his hysterical reaction to his chicken costume, or “sicken” as he calls it, it is likely that a vegan lifestyle is in his future.

I am happy to report that he may have been spared from countless sessions of hypnotherapy thanks to a little peer pressure from the cute, little, blond, spitfire in his daycare.  It seems Jeffrey, much like his father, has a penchant for blondes (go figure, I’m as dark haired as they come), and the rougher the blonde the better. 

Tattoos and a leathery, orange. fake tan?  Yes please.

When Blondie appeared in her princess costume, The little “sicken” wiped his tears and morphed in front of my eyes into the proudest rooster you ever did see.

Apparently real “sickens” don’t cry.

It’s “Taking Back Tuesday,” and I’m facing my personal inventory of gripes head on today. I’m putting them all out there in the Wild West of the Universe and letting the Big Man Upstairs sort them out.  You’ll see them once, and never again.  They’re dead to me.  In no particular order of importance:

• I’m tired of being wet.
• I’m tired of political ads and, more so, of the people who think they are biblical truth.
• I’m tired of cleaning up toys, stepping on toys, and having toys stuck to the bottoms of my feet; only to pick them up and have them dumped back on the floor when I go to the bathroom.
• I’m tired of paying in the $4 ballpark for a gallon of gas.
• I’m tired of shifting summer and winter wardrobes.
• I’m tired of watching men get paid HUUUUUUUGE salaries for what a woman can do before breakfast, and without all the “atta boys.”
• I’m tired of matching socks, only to find my pile of partner-less socks getting larger and larger.
• I’m tired of trying to decide whether or not to turn on the furnace.
• I’m tired of wiping boogers.
• I’m tired of cooking delicious dinner morsels that get caked in a) barbeque sauce, or b) ketchup, or are c) fed to our dog, Snoopy Jones.

Therefore, I have no other recourse than to axe my entire stash of bitches and moans in one fell swoop.  Tonight to celebrate my purge of negativity, I’m having a gyro all by myself… in the center of the toy heap, in dry clothes still warm from the dryer, with one sock on, and the television off.  The kitchen is closed and the ketchup is going on the fries only.  Let the boogers run.  Let the politicians whine.  Let the boys eat macaroni and cheese drowned in Heinz.

God, I love Tuesdays.