The Second Supper

The Topic: Share A Memorable Dinner

This is the story of not the first time, but the SECOND time The Agent had dinner with my family.

The first time was no big deal. The family was well behaved, and it was really unmemorable.

It was the second time that my family let the crazy out.

My father had grilled steaks, my stepmother had made mashed potatoes and a broccoli casserole. Also present were my stepbrother, my stepmother’s parents, and my stepmother’s grandparents.

(My stepmother is considerably younger than my father. In fact, we are close to the same age-- only 9 years apart. But that’s a different story)

My father held out his plate to The Agent. “Hey, Agent, would you mind putting some potatoes on my plate?”

The Agent was happy to oblige, and started to reach for the plate.

My dad freaked out. He yelled, “DON’T TOUCH MY PLATE! DON’T TOUCH MY PLATE!”

My dad is kinda a germaphobe.

The Agent was startled and let go. At the same time, my dad was tugging the plate away, so food went flying everywhere.

I gave Dad a warning look. I like this guy, Dad. Do not embarrass me.

As The Agent was trying to tidy up the mess around him, my stepmother’s grandmother, who was sitting next to The Agent, starting tugging on his sleeve. “Um, excuse me, Sir? Are you going to eat your fat?”

The Agent looked down at steak, confused. “Umm, well, I guess probably not.”

“Can I have it then?” the 82-year-old woman asked.

I shot my stepmother a look. Control your family.

“Grandma, no,” my stepmother chastised.

The poor Agent wanted to please my family, so he was quick to say, “oh, no, it’s no problem.” The Agent quickly cut off the end of his steak and passed the cuttings over to Grandma. “Do you have a dog at home?”

“No,” she answered. “Why would I give him this?” then she popped the whole blob of fat into her mouth. Gross.

“You’re very nice,” she flirted with her mouth full of fat, gazing into The Agent’s brown eyes. “I like you much more than the last boy Lovely brought over. She brought someone over last month who I didn’t much care for.”

I started banging on the head on my plate as my stepmother explained that The Agent was, in fact, the same boy I had brought over the month before.

I apologized multiple times to The Agent on the way back to my house that night. I was so embarrassed, but the Agent just laughed and said, "Don't worry, you'll make it up to me."

And I did make it up to him. Multiple times.

30 days of me

Day 02- The meaning behind your Blog name

It’s no secret that this is my second blog. My first blog was read by too many people who I knew in real life, so I had to start over, a bit more anonymously, and I had to think of a completely different name. It was much harder than I thought it would be, because I didn’t put much thought into the name of my first blog, and I didn’t realize until later that your blog name is pretty important.

I had an advantage with this blog because I had about a week to plan everything out before it was actually made public. During that time, I made new twitter and email accounts, thought of names for my husband and kids, added my blog list, made a blog button, and came up with a name. I knew I wanted something catchy, and something relatively easy to remember. I am fan of alliterations, so that played a part, as well.

Before I met The Agent, I was always looking for something in my life. I thought it was luck, I thought it was love, but now that I have both, I learned that I really needed to find myself, which is why I write.

Throughout my life, I’ve been looking for luck, love, and…. Myself.

Get it? I don’t know, I thought it was kinda cute.

More 30 days of me:
Day One

30 days of me

So, I got this idea somewhere else. I’m sorry, I can’t remember where I found it, and now I can’t refind it, so I can’t give proper credit. If this was your idea, send me an email and I’ll link to you!

Anyway, the idea is that for every day of the month, you write something about yourself. Cool, right? And you all know how much I love talking about myself, so this was right up my alley.  But here’s the thing: I don’t like to blog more than once a day, and there’s so many other things that I like to write about, so I really can’t write about myself every single day for a month. So, I decided to do it once a week instead. Not sure if it’ll stay on Tuesdays… maybe I’ll move to the weekend? To be determined.

Here are all 30 days, in case you want to do your own!

Day 01- A recent picture of you and 15 interesting facts about yourself
Day 02- The meaning behind your Blog name
Day 03- A picture of you and your friends
Day 04- A habit that you wish you didn’t have
Day 05- A picture of somewhere you’ve been to
Day 06- Favorite super hero and why
Day 07- A picture of someone/something that has the biggest impact on you
Day 08- Short term goals for this month and why
Day 09- Something you’re proud of in the past few days
Day 10- Songs you listen to when you are Happy, Sad, Bored, Hyped, Mad
Day 11- Another picture of you and your friends
Day 12- How you found out about Blogger and why you made one
Day 13- A letter to someone who has hurt you recently
Day 14- A picture of you and your family
Day 15- Put your iPod on shuffle: First 10 songs that play
Day 16- Another picture of yourself
Day 17- Someone you would want to switch lives with for one day and why
Day 18- Plans/dreams/goals you have
Day 19- Nicknames you have; why do you have them
Day 20- Someone you see yourself marrying/being with in the future
Day 21- A picture of something that makes you happy
Day 22- What makes you different from everyone else
Day 23- Something you crave for a lot
Day 24- A letter to your parents
Day 25- What I would find in your bag
Day 26- What you think about your friends
Day 27- Why are you doing this 30 day challenge
Day 28- A picture of you last year and now, how have you changed since then?
Day 29- In this past month, what have you learned
Day 30- Your favorite song

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Now here's Day 01- A recent picture of you and 15 interesting facts about yourself


This is me (taken Feb 6th)

15 interesting facts:

1. I am left handed.
2. I am a published writer (somewhere, in a dusty poetry anthology, is a sonnet called “The Dream.” That’s me. Good luck finding it).
3. I have a fear of bridges, specifically long bridges over bodies of water.
4. I am married with two kids. Bug is ours by birth, BK is ours through adoption.
5. My world is a better place with Diet Dr. Pepper in it.
6.  Some of my favorite books: The Shining, Wuthering Heights, The Notebook, and The Little House Books
7. Some of my favorite tv shows: Friends, Everybody Loves Raymond, The Office, The Walking Dead, Modern Family, The Bachelor
8. I am not a very social person-- not because I’m not friendly, but because I’m too lazy to clean the house.
9. Cats rule and dogs drool.
10. I played the clarinet starting in the 5th grade until I was a sophomore in high school.
11. I didn’t kiss a guy until I was 17.
12. I wasn’t allowed to wear red when I was child because my father didn’t like the color. And then I went and married a guy who also hates red. We have nothing red in our house or in our wardrobes. We are a very strange family.
13. My degree is in English. I went to school to be a high school English teacher. One semester was enough for me to realize that wasn’t the job for me.
14. I was on the swim team in high school. I was ok. I was also on the waterpolo team. We were not good at all. Our team won one game my senior year, against a team who didn’t have a pool. We thought we were so cool.
15. It is incredibly hard to think of 15 interesting things that I haven’t already told you guys.

A Story Of Love

Today was Adam’s birthday. He turned 3 today.

For my newer readers, Adam was the first baby we tried to adopt, before BK was born. We had him for four months, until a family member came forward and said she wanted him. We haven’t seen him since before his first birthday.

I miss him, I do. But I do not think of him as much as I did two years ago, when we first lost him. Some of it has to do with time: it heals all wounds. Part of it was that I always suspected that our match with Adam was not meant to be. Part of it was that I was able to get updates from his social worker from time to time, so I knew he was doing well.

But the main reason is BK. He was born about 4 months after we lost Adam.

When something bad happens in your life, you always wonder why. Why, oh why, is this happening to me? I lost my job, I wrecked my car, my husband passed away. Why me?

We are so ignorant. We have no idea about God’s Plan.

Why did you lose your job? Because then you wouldn’t have looked and found a better one three months later.

Why did you wreck your car? Because then you wouldn’t have had coffee at the Starbucks next to the body shop, where you met a woman who turned out to be a pastor’s wife and would soon introduce you to your new church.

Why did you your husband die? So you could live through the experience, through the pain and the hurt, and you could help someone else going through the same experience. Someone who’s not as strong as you are.

Lovely, why did you have a miscarriage? So I could find out I was pregnant with Bug three months later.

Lovely, why did you lose Adam? Because BK needed me more.

Because I needed him more.

Thank you, Lord.

The Power of Prayer

Friday was a good day in the Lovely Household. Bug got in to kindergarten.

Not just any kindergarten. THE kindergarten.

I wish I could say that we got in because of her brilliance, or even because I knew the right people, or because I paid someone off. But no, the schools are based on a lottery system. You apply, and they raffle off the spots. On the day of the lottery, my stepmother and I were present at my favorite school, and my father and The Agent were hearing the names called at his favorite school.

Here’s the story for my favorite school:

There are three kindergarten classes, with 22 children in each class. Siblings and children of employees get priority, and this year, that meant 24 spots were already filled, leaving only 42 spots before the lottery even started.

There were 302 applicants. Not the greatest odds.

My stepmother and I were one of 16 people present when the names were called. That in itself I found weird. 300 applicants and only 16 bothered to show up to see if they got in? I grumbled to my stepmother that I should get an extra entry for taking a day off work to show up.

Promptly at 9 am, they started calling names. The names were called quick, with no delay in between. A set of twins were called-- two spots taken at once (I might have dropped an F bomb at that point). A lot of boys were called, hardly any girls. C’mon, c’mon. Pick a girl’s name already, and let it be Bug’s.

At 30 names, and I was beginning to lose hope. Only 12 chances left. My stepmother said a prayer to her dead grandmother. “Grandma, you never got to meet Bug, but I know you’re watching over us. Reach your hand in and pull out Bug’s name.”

Bug was called at number 33.

Thank you, Grandma Alice.

Of course, I made a fool of myself and started crying. I was the only one who showed up to the lottery and whose child got in, and I‘m sure that made me seem like a total ass. I’m going to be known all next year as the mom who cried at the lottery. The principal even pulled me aside afterwards and gave me a hug. “I’m so glad you got in,” she said to me. “I saw you looking so nervous in the front row before the lottery and I was thinking it was going to break your heart if you didn’t get in.”

Why, yes. Yes it would. Good thing it didn’t come to that.

(Oh, and about the Agent’s first pick…. Well, she wasn’t so lucky there: 298 applicants, she was pulled at 293. Eh. Can’t win ‘em all!)

Speechless

The Topic: Write about a time a friend left you speechless.

So, there’s a girl I know who had a baby last week.

She claims she didn’t know she was pregnant.

I feel dumb because I had just seen her on Friday and I didn’t notice. In my defense, she wears her clothes baggy, and has always been a bit on the frumpy side. Still, she was never fat, you would think I would have noticed if she was hiding a basketball under her sweatshirt.

So, here’s what happened. She went to work on Monday, everything was fine. She went to bed Monday night. In the middle of the night, early Tuesday morning, she woke up and couldn’t get comfortable. She got up, went to the bathroom. Almost immediately, she felt like she had to pee again. She went to the bathroom again. Peed for days.

(my water never broke, so I cannot attest to this, but my friends who have say that this is what it feels like, except if you try to stop it mid stream, you can’t)

So, she went back to bed, and then started having intense stomach cramps. Writhing in pain. Her husband asked if he should call an ambulance-- he thought maybe she had appendicitis. She said no, but he should drive her to the hospital because something is seriously wrong.

He took her to the ER, she gave her symptoms to the intake nurse, they told her to sit in a wheelchair. She said no, it hurt to sit (that‘s because the baby's head was crowning). She stayed standing up, dealing with the pain, waiting for some drugs, and she felt like she had to go to the bathroom, but this time, Number 2. She’s not even in a room yet, so she goes to the bathroom in the ER waiting room.

And there, she pushed out a 6 and a half pound baby girl while on the toilet.

I know, gross, right? And I would totally call BS if I didn’t hear it straight from the horse’s mouth!

So, she thinks she’s going to the bathroom, but has a baby instead. She starts screaming, the nurses and her husband come in, the nurses run for a doctor, everything is taken care of.

Mom has been released from the hospital, baby is still there. I don’t think anything is wrong with her, I think they’re probably keeping the baby to make sure she’s ok, and I have to believe there’s an ongoing CPS investigation.  I mean, seriously. This is the act of a very scared teenager, someone extremely naïve, or someone seriously mentally disturbed. This is not the behavior of a 30-something married woman with a college degree.

I’m telling you, the whole story left me speechless.

Snip, Snip

It’s done. I will never be pregnant again.

We had been talking about The Agent getting a vasectomy for several months now. We knew it was the right thing to do, but neither of us really wanted to do it-- me because I don’t like the idea of never being pregnant again, and him because he didn’t want anyone taking a knife to his boys.

Finally, the day came. I went with him, because he was going to need a ride home after the surgery, and because it’s just fun to see my big strong Agent cry like a little girl. So, I dragged The Agent into the surgery center, with The Agent dragging his feet. The nurse asked for all his pre-op paperwork, and The Agent said, “Oops, I left my liability release at home. Guess you can’t do it.”

The nurse smiled. “I have a copy of it right here. No worries.” The nurse then handed me a card and said, “Here the doctor who will be performing the surgery today.”

The Agent and I sat down in the waiting room. “Let me see the card. Is it a guy or a girl?”
“Agent, it’s a guy. It’s going to be ok.”

The Agent sighed. “I feel a little better knowing it’s a guy. He’ll know what it’s like. A woman doesn’t understand. And what if she had just gotten into a fight with her husband? She’d be all rough, taking it out on me.”

“Well, it’s a guy, so you don’t need to worry.” I looked down at the card and chuckled. “Agent, look at the card. They spelled ‘cancellation’ wrong.”

The Agent looked at the card, then stood up. “We have to leave. He can’t even spell! You’re going to let this guy cut into me, and he can’t even spell????”

“Agent, sit down. It’s fine. I’m sure he didn’t print the cards himself.”

“But he ordered them! He proofread them! And he probably saw the mistake, and said ‘oh well, no big deal.’ What if he cuts off half my junk and says the same thing???”

I could only laugh, because by then, the nurse was calling him in.

Now, I didn’t hear him screaming from the waiting room…. But that’s because I went down to the pharmacy to get his prescription while I was waiting. The Agent told me afterwards that the doctor snipped one side, and The Agent said, “I’m done here. How effective would half a vasectomy be?” The doctor laughed and told him to keep still.

The whole thing was done in 30 minutes. The Agent hobbled out to the car while I helped him along. “What did they give me for the pain?” he asked.

“Tylenol 3.”

“What??? Is that all? No Morphine? Not even Vicodin? We need to get home right away. Don’t go over any speed bumps.”

Silly Agent.

That was three weeks ago. I can write about now, because The Agent was able to survive. It was touch and go there for awhile. The Agent called the doctor a couple time with complaints, and then even went in to see him, to which the doctor responded “You’re fine. Go home.”

But yes, The Agent is ok now. He was looking at me the other night and looked a little sad. “What’s the matter?” I asked.

“I was just thinking… you’ll never be pregnant again.”

Ugh. Too late to get sad about that now!

Random Acts of Kindness

I recently received a gift card for Starbucks. Oh, how I love me some Starbucks. My favorite drink used to be the nonfat peppermint mochas, but now I’ve moved on to the skinny vanilla lattes. Sometimes I’ll even splurge and get a blueberry scone (and then eat rice cakes for the rest of the day to try to make up for it).

The Starbucks by my office is always incredibly packed. It’s a good 15 minute wait at all times. But on Tuesday, the planets were perfectly aligned and I arrived with 20 minutes to spare. Awesome. I ordered a grande skinny vanilla latte in the drive thru.

When I got up to the window, I gave my gift card and said, “I would like to pay for whatever the guy behind me ordered as well.”

“That’s fine,” the perky Barista replied. “Is he your husband?”

“No,” I answered cheerfully. “I just want to buy his coffee.”

The girl was confused, but went to his retrieve his order. “Ummm… he ordered 3 specialty coffees, 2 muffins, and a breakfast sandwich. Add your coffee, and the total comes to $32.43. Do you still want to do it?”

Well… no, not really. But it’s not like I could back out now. And I had the gift card, so it’s not like really had to pay.

Except my gift card was only for $10, so I just paid over $20 for my coffee.

But it was ok. I did something nice. Yea for me. I went to work with a smile on my face. And I still got to work with 2 minutes to spare. Good thing, because I had a meeting first thing with one of my clients, who had recently been in a car accident and was injured. He was coming to my  office to give a statement about what happened, and we were meeting with his attorney.

My client came in two minutes later, with his hands full of Starbucks. “So nice to meet you,” he said, shaking my hand. “I thought you might like a morning pick me up. I wasn't sure what you liked, so I have a couple different choices for you.  And aren’t I lucky? The person in front of me paid for the whole thing! I think this is a sign I’m going to get a huge settlement!”

Oh, the irony….