"Hi, you've reached the Terry's..."

I figure everyone deserves an explanation about my phone habits in case you missed what I said in my "about me" section.

I HATE the phone. Hate answering it, double -- no, TRIPLE hate making a call. Seriously, I will email you back almost immediately if you leave me a voicemail, but if getting back to you requires an actual phone call, yikes. Don't hold your breath.

This being the case, when I stumbled across this post today I thought, "Oh. My. Gosh. I have a twin!". I don't plan on making a habit of poaching people's blog entries on a regular basis, but I am still exploring the blogosphere and am still frequently delighted to find strangers who sound like I do in my head.

(Read this and then come on back)

http://borrowedlight.blogspot.com/2007/11/my-nemesis-phone.html

I don't know what my deal is. Like the above blogger, it's not that I don't like talking (clearly) and I do love socializing with friends, but something about the phone just irritates me to no end. I don't think I really need to elaborate more, because I would just be re-stating everything from the other post, but I do just want to make sure all my friends know -- it's not you, it's me.

The big 2-9

We celebrated earlier, but I just thought you'd all love to know that I spent the evening of my actual birthday crouched over the toilet and hurling my guts out while Boone commented in the background, "I think you are allergic to leaving the beach." Nice.

You may begin commenting on how sorry you feel for me and how unlucky it is to be ending yet another beach vacation with food poisoning (I already played this vomiting game in Myrtle Beach in June).

You may not comment on how I should just shut up that I have been on two beach vacations this summer.

And.....go!

Procrastinating the day away...

OK, so my in-laws are arriving tonight and I have been putting off cleaning my house until the last possible minute. All weekend I ignored the growing chaos because I knew I would take care of it Wednesday. That's all fine and dandy until Wednesday arrives (which it did, about 13 hours ago, right on time) and I find myself feeling the way I do: I can't think of anything I would rather do less than clean my house.

And so I blog. About nothing, really. My best work has always come when I am under serious pressure, so I'll be running around the house spraying and sweeping and dusting and vacuuming starting around, oh...let's say 8:30 -- which will give me 2 hours before they arrive. Plenty of time, especially if I drink 3 or 4 energy drinks with dinner.

Now that that's settled, let me show you our new pet:




Yep, that's an armadillo. I got used to seeing these in Texas, but I was kind of surprised to see them in Georgia. I was even more surprised to see one alive, since they usually decorate the sides of highways around here (and colorfully, I might add). We have at least two that live behind our back fence and come dig up bugs under the trampoline almost every evening. But yesterday this guy was chillin' in our front yard and was not at all concerned about our kids being close by.


They're actually sort of cute, in an "armored rat" kind of way, and they're faster than you'd think when they decide to get going. What was less cute was discovering that it located an ant hill in one of my front beds and decided to go for broke digging it up. I'm not partial to the ants, but I'm not so big on armadillos doing this to my flower beds either:



Yeah, so that's fun.

Also fun:

At least he's trying to clean, right? This was Rylan's spray bottle of water for when I do her hair. What you can't really see in the picture is that he had sprayed so much of it that there was a pond on the counter that was cascading down onto the floor. Good times.

I have decided that my boys were nudists in their former lives, because it's all I can do to keep their family jewels covered throughout the day. Branik is okay with leaving his diaper on (as long as he can accessorize as he pleases), but yesterday Boone looked over about halfway through dinner and started snickering (but trying to hide it from the kids -- you know how well that works). I asked him what was so funny, and he said, "Did YOU notice that Keaton is naked from the waist down?" Nope. Hadn't noticed. He was wearing a shirt and when he's at the table I can only see him from the shoulders up, so he was able to sneak into his seat while we were finishing up dinner and no one was the wiser.

*Note to self -- clean that chair TWICE before in-laws arrive.

Sigh. I guess I should really go try to do something productive, like shower. I don't have the energy to write about how swimming lessons are going, so I guess I'm done. I wasted a good hour on this post (picture uploads people, picture uploads) which I will consider another success in the "putting off the inevitable" area of my life.

Any suggestions for armadillo names?

Not tonight, I have a headache

...from looking at my old template. It was a little too much for me so I decided to simplify a bit. I'm all stocked up on crazy over here, thank you very much, and now I am off to bed for a few glorious hours of unconsciousness.

STOP THE PRESS!

Notice anything unusual about this picture?


OK, it's a Target receipt with today's date. The day ends in "y", so what's the big deal? Look closer...

OK, you can't actually distinguish what I bought unless you are as hardcore as I am in my Target addiction. I'll just tell you -- are you ready for it? Really? OK then.

Those first 4 items you see are SHOES. Not individual shoes, but PAIRS! Yeah that's right -- I got 4 pairs of shoes for my kids for $3.24 a piece today (okay, 1 pair was $3.74, but still...) And yes, I really photographed my Target receipt (twice) to prove it.

I don't care if they fall apart after the first week for that price. No. Let me rephrase -- I wouldn't feel slighted if they had started to biodegrade in the car on the way home for that price. I spent quite a bit more than that on shoes for my kids in June, and the little snots already outgrew them. Don't worry, I've already cut them off of their vitamins and banned any food that has nutritional value, so that should slow things down a bit. In fact, if you really study my receipt, you will notice the last 4 items say "Haribo -- 4@ 0.69 ea." Yep, those are gummy bears, or as we are now calling them at our house, "dinner".

But the REAL news here -- the thing that has Boone reeling --would be that teeny tiny number at the bottom of the receipt.

$17.24

Make that $17.24

Oh. My. Holy. Freaking. Crapness. I went to Target and spent a measly $17.24?!?

Now calm down -- I know this goes against everything you know -- all the constants in your life, but I will make this up to you with a colossal shopping trip in the near future and harmony will once again return to the Universe.

This is my pledge.

In case you were wondering

I will most likely be smelling like Wheat Thins for the next 2 days since I ate about half of a FAMILY SIZE box tonight while staring at the TV/checking email and blogs on the laptop.

Actually, it'll probably be closer to Oreo Wheat Thins, since Boone and I honestly sat down with a new carton of Breyers Oreo ice cream and 2 spoons last night. We did leave some...at the bottom. Nothing like soothing emotional wounds and stress with food.

This is when I could use a little help from my bonus points idea...I'm such an all-or-nothing girl that if I "slip up" at any point during the day I just give up and gorge myself. It's gross and it makes me feel like poo, but 2 or 3 times a month I just go for broke and eat everything I see. I guess the one positive thing that comes from it is that I am so disgusted the next day that I do really well for a while. Except....ummm....what was that I said about Oreo Wheat Thins?

That's all I have tonight. Got to go sleep it off.

You asked for it...

So. This has been awhile in coming, but today I decided to go ahead and pull the trigger on a political post. I have refrained from this because I don't want to come off all preachy and whatnot, but then I realized a few things and changed my mind:

• I have been getting a lot of questions about my political views from people I go to church with -- especially since I stuck two Obama stickers on our car and then had the gall to drive it to church and park it next to all the Romney supporters' vehicles. ("Ohhhh, YOU'RE the ones!" -- we hear this pretty much every Sunday as we get back into our car). I figure if you really want to know what's up this is as good a way as any.

• This is my blog (well, Boone's too, but he feels the same way I do and has better things to do than post). Since this is my blog, I can say whatever I want. That being said...

• ...you can stop reading this whenever you want, although since I sift through all the conservative Republican forwards I get (I roll my eyes all the way through, but still...) I think the polite thing to do is keep reading until the end before you question my integrity. Feel free to roll your eyes, I can't see you.
  

Now that I have convinced myself that it is okay to share my views, let me also tell you that what I am about to post came from someone else's blog. I stumbled onto her site a few days ago and I think I may have found a long lost best friend in cyber-space. She is also an active member of the LDS church AND a self-proclaimed liberal Democrat (who bleeds Diet Coke just like I do:)

When I read what she wrote, I just felt that she had stated very simply what I have struggled to articulate, so I am borrowing her words:

"In the course of writing this blog, lots of people have asked me how I reconcile being Mormon and a Liberal. To me there was nothing to reconcile. I based my decision on my very Christian values. Help the sick. Aid the needy. For LDS readers, I am always reminded of Mosiah 4, where King Benjamin tells his people to help the poor, even if they don't necessarily deserve it.

I do not understand how a political party which clings to ideas such as "Family Values," the "Christian Right," and "National Morality," can be against universal health care. I do not understand the thinking that allows someone to decide that sick people should be rendered helpless by a bureaucracy.

I do not understand how someone reads the Bible, and at the part where Christ says "Suffer, the little children," interprets it to mean "Suffer, little children." Because in America the Republican Party will vote down laws that will give you health care. Republican administrations will cut the funding for WIC (health care for underprivileged INFANTS.) They will vote against SCHIP but fund a war we have no hope of winning. They will cut funding for public education, thus widening the gap between the rich and the poor.

I do not understand it.

I do understand this-

"The uninsured are sicker, suffer more from chronic disease, and rarely get rehabilitation after an injury or surgery. They also die sooner-knowing that, with insurance, they might have lived." (Newsweek, September 07)

I also understand numbers-46 million Americans are uninsured. 46 million people die earlier because the Republican Administration says that government-run health care is socialism. Forget the fact that we've had government run health care for decades. (It's called Medicare, and oh, they cut funding for that too) What I want to see is some more 'Compassionate Conservatism." I want more "Family Values" that care less about what Americans are doing under the sheets and more about what sick kids, elderly people, and veterans are doing when they can't see a doctor. I want a type of Morality that knows the difference between good- health care for children, and bad-depriving infants of pre and post natal care.

Where are the Christians in the Republican Party? Where are the good Samaritans who help their sick and uninsured neighbors and their underprivileged kids?

I guess I just can't think that way. I guess I just can't vote that way. That is why I'm a Liberal. That is why I'm a Christian."

I read that and said, "Amen, Sister!" I do not expect many of you to agree with me, but I decided that's okay. We can disagree and still be civil to one another, and maybe after reading this you will understand a little bit of why we vote the way we do.

And maybe, just maybe, the number of "Obama is a secret Muslim"/"Democrats are conspiring to drive up gas prices"/"global warming is a hoax" emails will quit flooding my inbox:)

In case you want it (and to fully credit the author), the link to the blog I borrowed the quote from is:

www.mormonchildbride.blogspot.com

Don't get all freaked out by her blog's name -- she is hilarious, intelligent, and insightful. Thanks for listening (all 3 of you who made it this far). I will resume talking about unimportant stuff like weight loss and the smell of my hall bathroom ASAP.