Category: Unimportant Crap

But Was It a Radioactive, Genetically-Engineered Spider?

 • 23 Comments

So, I was in Maui last week. It was lovely. A bad week in Maui could trump a good week most other places, I think. I did find Maui to be a little bitey, though.

Radioactive genetically engineered spider bite

I didn’t see the biter, but it looks like an odd bite to me. So I told Steve I thought there was a decent chance he was about to married to a super hero. He asked if my spidey-sense was tingling, but after locating my spidey-sense, I still couldn’t decide whether it was tingling or not. Then again, what if it wasn’t a spider? Maybe it was a radioactive, genetically-engineered mosquito and I’m checking the wrong sense for tingles. Although, despite hating spiders, I do think I would prefer to be a spider-based super hero than a mosquito one. Or, God forbid, a bed bug.

This post got weird fast. Anyway, I think there’s a chance I could be one of the Avengers in a few months. Like one of the freaky-deaky ones – not one of the ones that are just really good at shit. Although I’d settle for being that kind, too.

I’ll leave you with this sexy picture of Maui. Lest you think it’s all about the spiders.

IMG_20141027_113103_638Aloha.

I Will Scare the Crap Out of Your Children For Only $2 Bucks an Hour.

 • 26 Comments

Welcome to “Babysitting 101” with Erin. We’ll start with what not to do (since, as with most things, that’s my strong suit).

When I was 12, I babysat a lot. We lived in a vacation town and what vacationing parents aren’t dying to get away from their children?

One dark and stormy night (or one warm June evening) I went to babysit for a very nice couple (at their vacation cabin in the woods) who had an 8-year-old girl and a 10-year-old boy…and they each had a friend with them. So, do the math…I’ll wait. Yes. That’s four kids. Now – it wasn’t the number of kids so much as the balance of power thing…cause I was only a couple of years older than the boys which didn’t instill me with a tremendous amount of authority.

The evening started out fine…we played with those toys that were big cats that turned into robots Transformer style? (Totally aside the point – but they were awesome.) An hour or so in, things started to unravel and my little monsters realized they did not actually have to listen to me. At all. This realization degraded into the lot of them running out the front door into the woods…forcing me to find a flashlight and pursue the little bastards. Once I finally wrangled them back into the house, I was at my wit’s end…and I was only 12…my wit wasn’t very long to begin with.

So I told them a little story. (*Note: I do not condone this – but it was wildly effective and slightly hilarious in retrospect.) Let me preface this by saying, I am quite the actress…especially when pushed to desperation. I told them that I was a werewolf and had (regrettably) eaten the last children I babysat for. I described it something like this:

Werewolf Babysitter

Now, I know what you’re thinking…no way they’d fall for it, right? You underestimate me, my friend. I cried…actually cried…while telling them the story about how I lost my temper and turned into a werewolf…and awoke in the aftermath, covered in adolescent blood with mutilated corpses in the house. Well, within 5 minutes, I had four exceptionally obedient children in bed, none of them speaking above a whisper. I still remember the boy asking, “how are you feeling now? Do you think you’ll turn?” And me answering, somberly, “no…I’m feeling much calmer. I think it’ll be okay.”

I did come clean to the mom when she was driving me home that night. She was surprised but more amused than angry. And they did ask me to babysit again (unfortunately, after assuring the children that I was not a lycanthrope so that card could only be played once). And so began my lifelong love of terrorizing children.

TBT, FBF, WBW, WTF.

 • 32 Comments

Okay. Think of this as an intervention. Stop the madness, people.

Remember when someone came up with “Throw Back Thursday?” And everyone thought, “How fun! I want to post old pictures, too!” And all the little soldiers fell in line and started posting old pictures every Thursday.

Now this shit is just getting out of hand. Now we have “Flashback Friday” and “Way Back Wednesday,” too. WE GET IT. You like posting old pictures of yourself! I don’t blame you. I was younger, skinnier and apparently having more fun in the past as well, but that doesn’t justify inventing stupid names for every day of the week! (Whoever started “Man Crush Monday,” “Woman Crush Wednesday” and “Selfie Sunday” deserve a public flogging. Also, we should bring back public floggings. And “Selfie Sunday?” Really? I have a 20-year-old daughter. EVERY day is “selfie” day. Which is why I nicknamed my daughter Vanity Smurf.)

Vanity Smurf

Here’s a thought. If you run across an old picture you are certain will delight the Facebook/Twitter/Instagram masses…post it! <GASP!> How can I possibly post an old picture if it isn’t a Wednesday, Thursday or Friday??? Figure it out, Rebel. Time to forge your own way in the world.

Welcome to “This Shit Has To Stop Thursday.”

Home Improvement Blows.

 • 25 Comments

So, we are trying to sell our house. This translates to “let’s do every little home improvement project we wanted to do for the last 10 years but were too lazy to do and continually procrastinated on so that we can turn around and sell our house and never enjoy all the freaking work we just put into it.” Or something like that. It also loosely translates to “the house was in fine shape until we put the damn thing on the market and now everything is falling apart.”

Case in point: paint. So, I may have sort of started painting half the house about eight years ago…and gotten bored part way through and stopped. And then I went to law school and did some other stuff that more legitimately justified my unfinished painting project for eight years running. Okay, so finish it, Stupid. Seems simple enough…but…I can’t remember the names of the paint colors from eight years ago and leftovers are nowhere to be found. So last weekend involved going to Kelly Moore and looking through 10-year-old paint swatches trying to remember if my dining room was Bohemian or Greystone. Because there are 87 goddamn shades of beige. SO fun. I finally remembered the dining room colors, but it wasn’t happening with the master bath so I just repainted that WHOLE thing back to its previous color. Yay!

Then, a few days ago, we awake at 6:30am to hear our daughter freaking out about ants. We go into her room and this is what we find:

Ant Problem

Okay. Well not exactly. Because my daughter is 15 and doesn’t really dress like that. Anyway, point being…we haven’t had a problem with ants in the house in YEARS. Put the son of a bitch on the market and voila – ants. So after 45 minutes with the vacuum and what became the “ant holocaust” – no more ants. You’re going to have to do better than that, House!

Then I’m in the service porch and I notice a missing piece of tile – a corner piece. Not chipped, not cracked, gone. My house is 27 years old! I’m going to go out on a limb and say I’m not gonna be able to find a piece of matching tile! Does ANYONE know what happened to it? Of course not. No idea. Noticed it missing…but didn’t think to mention it. This is a 4″ x 1″ piece of ceramic tile. I firmly believe that if you knocked it off, you would have heard it fall. But noooooo…it was the leprechauns, apparently. Then I counted to 10 so that I wouldn’t grab the good vodka from liquor cabinet and run away from home.

Oh – and for some insane reason, when my 15-year-old was little, we didn’t stop her from sticking stickers on her bedroom door. I can’t explain it. I guess it was cute for a while. Well, she’s added over the last 10 years to the tune of about 500 stickers. you really could barely see the door through them. Yes, it would have been easier to just buy and paint a new door, but I was feeling particularly cheap last weekend so me and my OCD spent 3 hours peeling stickers off her bedroom door. She helped. I would like to thank Hello Kitty for making stickers that come off in one piece and leave no tacky residue behind. I would like to tell Zoo Books to go straight to Hell because their stickers are made with some kind of satanic glue that only a significant amount of paint thinner could cope with.

Sigh. Anyway, this is all still a work in progress. I won’t go into the back-breaking day we spent weeding and covering half the yard in bark. Next weekend I get to go to Home Depot like I’m on some shitty scavenger hunt looking for a single piece of archaic tile. Labor Day – shmaber day. I’m going to be working on the fucking house.

And how many people have come to see our beautiful home that is now looking the best it has in a decade??? TWO. In three weeks. TWO showings. And this, Kids, is why mommy drinks.

Lessons From Comic-Con.

 • 21 Comments

I went to San Diego last weekend for Comic-Con International (Nerd-Fest 2014). Here are my take-aways.

Comic-Con 2014

  1. Dressing up is totally worth it. It’s a weird combination of public humiliation and your 15 minutes of fame. We posed for dozens of pictures and Archer fans treated us like we were part of a secret club.
  2. Walking around a convention in 5-inch heels for four hours requires taking precautions to avoid injury causing you to limp around like an asshole for the five days following the convention.
    Buffy Lana and Archer at Comic-Con

    Buffy, Lana and Archer go to Comic-Con.

  3. I did not take appropriate precautions.
  4. As my friend pointed out (I don’t have permission to use her name on my blog so we’ll just call her Cameron Diaz), “looking that hot kinda makes the pain worth it, though.”
  5. Cameron went as Buffy but never had her stake in her hand so she apparently just passed for your average, I-wear-leather-pants-in-the-middle-of-summer-in-San-Diego convention-goer.
  6. Dress your dog in a matching Superman costume and you are a rockstar.
  7. It is possible to get sick of hearing people call out “danger zone!” when you walk by.
  8. Like Halloween, some women seem to use these conventions as an excuse to wear as little as humanly possible.
  9. They do not serve alcohol in the convention center.
  10. They should serve alcohol in the convention center.
Me and Bumble Bee

Me and Bumble Bee.

 

How I Lost My Street Cred.

 • 20 Comments

Just kidding. I never had any. I am 100% suburban white bread who is urban-impaired. This was a gift from one of my best friends a few years ago:

Slang Flashcards

Which was funny, yes. Useful, no. Cause I know the words, but they sound ridiculous coming out of my mouth. But I do it anyway because it’s entertaining to my black, Mexican, middle-eastern and *native American friends who laugh **with me, not at me, when I say anything remotely “street.” And, yes, I felt ridiculous just saying “street.” I’ve got no game, I’m lacking in mad skills, and I straight fail on playin’ cool.

I can, however, quote The Family Guy with the best of them. That earns me no street cred, but my nerds feel what I’m puttin’ down. ***Word to your motha.

 

* Whatever. She’s blonde-haired and blue-eyed and thinks that her 25% Native American gives her more street cred than me. Dream on, Cupcake.

** I suspect at times they keep me around for comic relief…to laugh *with* me. My ass.

*** Apparently since “word” came about in the ’80’s and I am an 80’s child, I am allowed to use that one without repercussions.

Happy Birthday…And the Power of Christ Compels You.

 • 16 Comments

This is a list of some of the gifts I received this weekend from my darling friends:

  • One bottle of wine
  • One bottle of champagne
  • TWO bottles of rye whiskey
  • One set of mason jar shot glasses
  • One “Do It Yourself Exorcism Kit”…since one of my friends who housesat for me has reported back that my house is definitely haunted

Do It Yourself Exorcism Kit

  • And this…because it’s weird and prickly like me and I was assured that the girly color was a reflection of the giver and not the receiver

Strange, Prickly and Pink

My husband bought me a book and some superhero undies.

So, based on the gifts from those that know me best, I’m apparently a weird, nerdy, drunk with really funny friends (who, let’s be real, are basically a bunch of nerdy drunks, themselves).

 

iPod Confessional.

 • 21 Comments

The top 5 most embarrassing things on my iPod. Because when I can’t think of anything clever to write, embarrassing usually does the trick.

5. The theme song from “The Greatest American Hero.” And, believe it or not, now you’re singing it in your head. You’re welcome.

Image

4. The Hannah Montana soundtrack. Yes, originally I had little girls and had a valid excuse for having it on my iPod…but that doesn’t really explain why it’s still on there. When my girls are 15 and 20. And would rather clean the refrigerator than listen to it.

Image

3. Call Me Maybe by Carly Rae Jepsen. Yeah, yeah, I know. I’m the only one who ever thought that song was catchy. Just keep telling yourself that.

Image

2. Both Sides Now by Judy Collins. Because I’ve looked at clouds from both sides now, and I really don’t know clouds at all.

Image

1. FIVE songs from that one musical episode of Buffy the Vampire Slayer when Joss Whedon was apparently high and thought having the cast sing made perfect sense. So, yes, feel free to blame Joss (we’re on a first-name basis) for Glee…cause I’m pretty sure it started with Singing Buffy.

Image

It should be noted that friends do not ask to borrow my iPod during parties. And my iPod typically will not win the vote when deciding what to listen to in the car. Oh well. My musical tastes are clearly just too evolved for the main stream.

I Wish My Life Was a “Choose Your Own Adventure” Book. Oh. Wait…

 • 25 Comments

Image

I loved those books as a kid. I had the “Deadwood City” one and “The Sinister Studios of KESP-TV” one. I went through them all. I didn’t have one adventure – I had every adventure.

As adults, we remember loving them, but we don’t realize we’re still living them. Because that’s what life is, right? A “Choose Your Own Adventure” story. What’s missing? The “do-over” when your questionable decision leads you to that inevitable line telling you “you’ve died.”

I’ve chosen wisely and we all know I’ve chosen poorly…a lot. But, given that I can’t flip to the beginning of the book and fix my wrong turns, I guess even the poor choices say something. Because many wrong turns simply mean that you were willing to risk losing for the chance at winning. Or it means that you’re stupid. In my case? Probably some of both. But, bravery or stupidity, I do love turning the page every day.