I'm It!

Recently, I was tagged by a few of my fellow mommy bloggers to do a meme listing 6 of my random, boring, unspectacular quirks. At first I was a little offended because, well, I have no quirks. I'm perfect. Just ask WD. He always tells me, "Oh, I forgot, you're perfect." So what if it's always during an argument. It still counts, right?

Wrong! Oh, I've got me some quirks, alright. And here's 6 of them. Thanks to Dawn (Dawn's Daily Life), Jennifer (Happily-Ever-After-Land), and Merrie (Sleepless Mornings) for the tag!

1. I don't really like to touch food with my fingers while eating. It makes me feel, I don't know, greasy or messy or something. Ugh. Even when I eat pizza I use a knife and fork.


2. After I read a book, it takes me awhile to start a new one. Particularly if it was a good book. I have to take time to mourn the loss of the characters.


3. I've really tried to like coffee--black, no sugar, no cream. It smells so good and seems like the grown up thing to do. But I just don't like it. Now add equal parts milk and a couple of ounces of flavored syrup and serve it over ice, that's another story.


4. I've jumped into the 21st century by paying bills online but I still opt to have my bills sent to me by mail. I'm not ready to go completely paperless.


5. This may be un-American of me but I don't like going to the movies. Unless it's a matinee and the theater is fairly empty. I don't like sitting next to strangers, sharing an armrest, the collective laughter and sniffles, the spontaneous applause, and the crinkling of wrappers during quiet moments. Yep. I'll stick to matinees.


6. Onions make me cry. Big time. I can't cut an onion without stopping halfway, blindly throwing my knife down, and running around the kitchen fanning my eyes to make them stop stinging and tearing up. It's like I just got finished watching Titanic. I don't know how Rachel Ray does it.

Tag! You're it!

Wordless Wednesday: Family

R.O.C.K. In The U.S.A.

Look what I got! The awesome Jenn over at The Peacock's Nesting Place gave this to me. Jenn has just moved back to the United States after spending a year in England with her family. And as soon as she gets finished unpacking, she'll start blogging about her adventures here. But no more pictures of castles, unfortunately. Thanks again, Jenn!

Remember back in early July, everyone in the blogosphere put up pictures and videos of their Independence Day activities? Yeah, well, I just got around to putting together a slideshow of our Fourth of July celebration so lets just pretend that it's actually July 5, that August does not begin this week, and that I am not a procrastinator. Okay?

Here's some pictures of the family, food, and fireworks accompanied by the music of Johnny Cougar, John Cougar, John Cougar Mellencamp, John Mellencamp. Also known as my boyfriend in 1988.

Indianapolis

Angie's talking about music over at my pretty purse today. Check it out!



So, yesterday, Nascar was like "Hey, drivers, Goodyear hasn't tested their tires on this track yet so there might be a few problems" and the drivers were like "Oh, yeah, there's gonna be MORE than a few problems" and Elliott Sadler was like "What tire problems?"

Elliott's tires held up better than a lot of the other cars. His team made some good moves throughout the race (great pit stops) and after 160 laps and 11 yellow flags (7 of them were competition cautions because of tire concerns) he had his best finish of the year. FOURTH! This moves him up 2 spots to 21 in the standings. Top 12 makes the Chase.

Jimmie Johnson gets the win, Michael Waltrip gets the red lantern, and we're at Pocono Raceway next Sunday.

Go Fish

It's Poetry Friday! Sometimes while searching for a particular poem I'll come across another one, totally different in style and subject, and jot it down for a future PF post. While searching for poems about fish (I took the boys to an aquarium Tuesday), I somehow came across this poem by Jo McDougall. It has absolutely nothing to do with fish. But it really speaks to me. It says that I'm easily distracted. And it also brings to mind people, leaders, followers, expectations, disappointments, fantasy, reality, magic, logic, and truth.

What We Need by Jo McDougall

A Contrast Of Siblings

I know I've mentioned my sister, Angie, numerous times on this blog but did you know I have a brother too? Yep. I do. His name is Steven and he lives in Florida so I only see him once, maybe twice, a year. He's also 6 years older than I am--and a boy-- so we weren't really close growing up. Okay, so he did design clothes for my Barbie dolls, but other than that, we just didn't have much in common.

For the past 2 weeks, Steven has been traveling around France and Germany. For the past 2 weeks, I've been to Walmart 4 times.

While in Germany, he visited the Cologne Cathedral which contains the remains of the 3 Wise Men. At church last Sunday, the boys were a holy terror, so while in the cry room, I put them each in a corner. During Mass. In front of Father William. And I'll do it again if I have to.

In Paris, Steven was served croissants, (real) French onion soup, and fine wine. I serve my family fruit loops, pb&j sandwiches, and juice boxes. Daily.

He spent hours walking with his boyfriend along the Brittany coast in France. I spent hours last Monday trying to get the pee smell out of my living room carpet from where the boys tipped over their potty.

I think this is where I'm supposed to say how I wouldn't trade my life for his and motherhood is full of joy and wonder and blah, blah, blah, but dangit, I want some croissants too! And I don't mean from Walmart!

Howard

Just 4 months ago, our yard was covered with snow. Now it's covered in HOT. Yesterday, the temperature hit 100 degrees, with a heat index of 434. Forget about moving to Hawaii, my Sibes want to move to Alaska!