The Things You Find in Your Washing Machine

Everyone finds stuff in their washing machine from time to time: hair ties, little video games cartridges, crayons - UGH, chap stick and occasionally money.  It's kinda like playing the lotto...you usually lose but every once in a while you get a little pay out.  I guess its a kind of reward for being the one who has to do the laundry.  So yeh, if I find money, it's mine! 

But the other day I found something very interesting in the laundry.  I wouldn't exactly say I hit the jackpot!  I open up the washer and shake out Ellen's bed sheets...cuz it appears a bunch of socks have gotten stuck inside the elastic corners.  I hate it when that happens!  So I am shakin' and gettin the stuff out when I give the sheet one last good crack up in the air.   And through the air flies this weird substance that hits me in the top of the head.  It almost felt like shrapnel...but softer and I might even say a bit on the squishy side.  After the impact the tiny objects quickly fall to the ground.  Of course my eyes immediately follow them to their resting places on the laundry room flow.  Hmmm!  I stare in disbelief.....LITTLE BITS OF HAMBURGER.  I frantically start shaking my head in horror, to free the rest of the beef from my hair.  I was much more comfortable with the thought that I was hit in the head with shrapnel then the knowledge that I had hamburger particles in my hair.  The fact that it was clean hamburger....really didn't help much.

It takes several minutes to free all the hamburger from my hair, the rest of the laundry, the washer and the rubber seal around the washer door.  I find myself thinking that this washer has a serious design flaw,  "if the manufacturer could only see how impossible it is to get exploded hamburger out of the door seal they would have never designed it this way".  IT'S TRUE!

Anyway, you may ask how did a hamburger get in my washer?  I know I did.  I have a couple theories.  First of all, we did have a party the night before.  Lots of people where over.  However, no hamburgers were served.  And to my knowledge, no outside beef was brought in.  Then of course we do have the puppy.  And the garbage outside in the garage was torn up.  But if Maggie actually found a hamburger...do you think she would just leave it lying around.  No, I think she would suck it down in one obnoxious growling gulp.  Then there is the final theory.  If you recall they were Ellen's sheets.  I am so sorry Ellen.  But the prior evidence against you is a bit damning.  Past items that I have found in Ellen's bed do include: an apple core, a half eaten candy bar, and a partially eaten sandwich.

Well, I doubt we will ever solve this mystery.  But I do know that I will be a little more careful when loading the washer and a lot more careful when emptying it.  And for your future reference beef does not wash well!

Best Day Ever

Gavin pitched his first Majors baseball game last night.  I must say that pitching is very stressful on the mother of the pitcher.  His first inning went great, but then a few wild pitches and I was a wreck.  What if he hit someone, walked a bunch of kids or got all nervous?  Well, that didn't happen.  He ended up getting the win for day and the coach gave him the game ball, which I think he slept with.  He also got like 3 hits and was hit by 2 different pitchers.  So he was on base 5 times.  One of the mom's over heard telling a buddy in the dug out that this was his best day ever.  REALLY?  I was stressed out and you got nailed pretty darn hard, TWICE, right in the butt cheek.  I find it amazing how kids forget the dumb bad stuff and just move on.  Actually he turned the bad thing into a kind of cool battle scar.  Unfortunately his battle scar is on his butt.  So his sisters are pretty much scarred for life after being shown it repeatedly.  I really hope he is over that because he is hanging out at girls' basketball camp today!  But seriously, I think we can really learn a lot from our kids.  Don't sweat the small stuff.  Bad stuff doesn't last long (and maybe it'll leave a cool bruise you can show your friends), and be happy with your accomplishments.  Hmmm, I had been having a relatively crumby month at work...but seriously it seems a bit silly to dwell on it.  And something positive does always come out of a bad experience.  I guess I should be looking for the "bruise" that I can show everyone.  (Don't get me wrong...I love my job, just not some of the politics that comes along with it.)

Things I ponder.....

I just went to Rite-Aid yesterday at 5pm and bought a bottle of Vodka.  As I was paying for it I somehow felt guilty or bad.  It was weird.  Like there was something just plain wrong about buying vodka in the middle of the day.  I get a similar feeling when I buy myself a candy bar.  Hmmmm!  Why do you suppose I feel "bad" when I buy these things?  And its not the fun, I am such a rebel kinda bad.  I am a grown adult if I wanna suck down vodka and candy bars, in moderate amounts, I should be able to without feeling guilty...what the heck!

My puppy sometimes eats out of the cat box.  If she is in the garage too long by herself she is probably having a gross crunchy snack.   Somebody once told me it is because she is lacking something in her diet.  Like what would you be lacking in your diet that eating poop would fix?  That just doesn't make any sense.  And besides she eats puppy chow.  I thought that was a no brainer...pour puppy chow in the bowl and the dog eats and that's all they need.  Well, besides some water......and apparently a little cat poo.

I just planted onion sets in my garden.  I am a seasoned gardener but I must admit the onion thing confuses me.  If you plant an onion and get an onion....how do you get more onions? Because I know we eat them too.  So if it is a one to one ratio thing we should run out of onions world wide here pretty darn soon.  I will keep posted on what happens with this one as they grow this summer.

I understand shoes without socks.  Sometimes you just wanna be cool and a little more free feeling.  But socks without shoes...this I don't understand.  Gavin and Ellen do this all the time.  They will actually put on socks and then go outside.  Your socks get wet, crusty and dirty and feel gross.  Don't even get me started on how it ruins the socks for life and they can never be really clean agian.  But why wouldn't you just go out barefoot or slip on your shoes with no socks.  This would be way quicker and more comfortable either way.  I just don't understand putting on socks and then going outside.

I read in a woman's health magazine that women who run tend be skinny.  And I believe this.  You really don't see a fat runner very often.  Oh, you see fat walkers.  But this makes me wonder.  I run yet I am not skinny.  Hmmm! maybe I need to go faster, maybe I still fall in the walker range, or will at some point I just magical become skinny. Like if I run on average an 8 minute mile poof I am skinny. (If I knew exactly what speed I had to run to be skinny I would definitely do it.) Or maybe others can't actually see me when I run because I am definitely not skinny.  And you only see skinny runners because the fat ones are somehow hidden from the rest of the world because it is just too scary for us to handle. Hmmm!

Hmmm!

I have a few minutes before I head off to pick up my lunch...at 4:11.  I didnt exactly get a chance to eat today because work was too busy and now it is almost dinner time and I am starving.  So I may be dilusional while typing.  I can't quite decide what to write about.  My cousin writes about her incredibly cute son.  And he is incredibly cute and does really note worthy stuff.  My kids, although they are really cute, they haven't really done anything blog worthy this past week.  I could write about stuff that annoys me...but I just have a few minutes before I pick up lunch.  That would take hours to write about.  I am easily annoyed.

So I decided to keep it simple to a top 10 list...

Top 10 favorite things Gavin & Ellen to do at the hardware store after school while waiting to go home

10) String all the paper clips together...this is wildly popular with Papa and Uncle Gary.  Nothing like grabbing that paper clip only to get 50 of them.  Funny stuff.
9) Eat popcorn
8) Drop popcorn on the floor
7) Use the office computer....did you know that Neopets has viruses that can infect a company computer?...or so I hear! 
6) Argue...although that is favorite everywhere...not just at the hardware store
5) Play with Snickers, the cat, although I think her name too has been changed to Kevin
4) Have races on the rental dollies... up and down the center aisle of the store is of course the best location for this.
3) Do homework....yeh who we kidding.  It gones done but is far from a favorite
2) Call mom on the cell phone and ask her when she is coming home
1) Hang out with Papa

I think this would be an appropriate time to thank Papa for picking the kids up from school everyday and putting up with their antics!

Maggie

Well we have had our new puppy, Maggie for a couple of months now.  She seems to be working out quite well, which is amazing if you consider our past history with dogs.  There was Harley, the beagle / sheepdog...don't ask.  Gilbert, the dog who liked to eat Gavin.  One of them had to go.  The girls voted for Gavin, leaving that is.  Nice sisters!  Good thing I had the deciding vote.  Buffy, the vanishing and reappearing dog.  She was gone for like 3 months one winter, only to show back up all bald and crazy.  Or was it really Buffy???  There is a convincing argument that she was an impostor.  Then we had Oscar.  A crazy little dog who liked to feed on the neighbor boy and last but not least Fred, the shelter dog.  He was apparently abused and never house broke, and like to runs....all the time, everywhere!  So yes, the track record on dogs is pretty discouraging.  However, Maggie appears to be a winner.

Maggie, is an almost 4 months old Yorkie.  She weighs about 3 pounds and is super cute. So far we have seen no crazy tendencies.  She has some potty training issues...but she is still a baby.  She absolutely loves our two cats.  The feelings are unfortunately not mutual.  (Cats are a whole other story...a possible future blog.)

So I think Maggie is gonna work out.  Gavin would really like to change her name to Kevin.  But I think we will stick with Maggie.

Yes, this photo makes her look freakishly long and skinny like a weiner dog.  Must be a weird camera angle...she has normal proportions.

A New Kind of Profiling

As everyone probably knows it is illegal to text while you are driving.  The theory is that if you text while you drive you will be distracted and won't keep your eyes on the road and this could cause an accident.  Probably a good theory.  Everyone is not as coordinated as me, and likely doesn't have the skills to text while driving. 

But isn't this a little like profiling?  Don't get me wrong I believe distracted driving is wrong.  But do we just single out the texters and target this group?  Is that really right?  I have seen women doing their makeup while driving, a guy reading the newspaper while driving on I-75, and I won't even go into how many times I have seen people smackin' at their kids in the back seat.  All of this behavior is distracted driving and also very dangerous.  But it is totally legal.  Go ahead and do your make up, read the paper, and beat your kids...just don't text while driving! 

The federal government is not allowed to profile.  Just because a few middle eastern folks blow up buildings and airports, it doesn't mean they all do.  This is why blowing up buildings and airports is illegal and being middle eastern is perfectly legal.  I draw the same comparison to texting while driving.  Yes it is probably dangerous in most cases.  But texting in itself is not the evil thing.  It is driving while distracted that is bad.  We have focused on too small of an issue and are missing the big picture.  People do many dumb things while driving.  Let's make all the actual dumb things illegal and not just choose one aspect and single it out.

Will I continue to text while driving?  Probably not.  But there are occassional exceptions to every rule.  And do I want people to keep sending me youtube videos of people dying while they are texting?  No I don't.  But if I could find that guy that reading the paper on I-75 you could send him some disturbing videos.