It's candy, bee-yotch

I got Chinese food last night - extra spicy. As I was munching on a pepper, I remembered a story from my childhood. Reason #4,567,852 why I love my Daddy.

I was about 8 or 9 years old and Mommy had agreed to babysit a coworker's daughter for the weekend. She was around the same age as my sister and me, so Mommy thought it would be fun. Plus, the coworker and her husband had to go out of town. The woman dropped the girl off and she seemed cool while her mother was there...but then when her parents left, she turned into a straight up bitch.

I don't remember exactly what she did, but I do remember that I could not stand her ass. Neither could my sister. Neither could my mother. Neither could my father. I do remember her being really bratty and demanding...only because that was to be her downfall.

On Saturday, Daddy took us out for Chinese food. This lil' bitch was yelling and screaming about what she was going to eat and what she wasn't going to eat. Fast forward to chow time. My father LOVED spicy food. He also enjoyed making a show of eating the peppers. Lil' Bitch couldn't stand that Daddy was getting all of the attention and began to whine and scream.

Lil' Bitch: "I want some"
Daddy : "No you don't, this is for grown ups"
Lil' Bitch: "I WANT SOME. I WANT SOME. I WANT SOME."
Daddy: "No"
Lil' Bitch (who is standing in her seat at this point) "GIMME SOME"
Daddy: "Okay - you can try one and if you like it, you can have some more" (Hands Lil' Bitch a red chile pepper)
Lil' Bitch: "What is it?"
Daddy: "It's candy."

At this point, we were all stunned. Daddy did not believe in harming kids nor did he lie very often. My sister and I were even more stunned that Mommy didn't intervene.

Lil' Bitch happily popped the pepper in her mouth and then her expression began to change. Her eyes welled up and she had this look on her face like "WTF?". As she reached for the water, my father pulled it away.

Daddy: " I told you that was for adults but you didn't listen. From now on, you are going to behave like the wonderful little girl I know you are. For the rest of the weekend you will be nice to my daughters. You will listen to me and Ms. Gloria. You will not talk back, you will not be rude. We want to have a good time with you. Understood?"

Lil' Bitch nodded her head.

Daddy opened up his hand and told her to spit out the pepper. He then gave her some rice and asked the waiter to bring some milk. He was so sweet to her - he picked her up, gave her a big hug and sat her on his lap until her mouth felt better. As a bonus, he took us all out for ice cream afterwards.

Although it was extreme -it worked. She was so much fun after that. We had a great time for the rest of the weekend.

Makeover Chronicles....

is alive and well

The Makeover Chronicles

Foot Fetish

I heart shoes...and not in that stereotypical "fat chick who has lots of shoes because she can't fit into regular clothes" type way. In addition to being a fat chick, I also have large feet...so even if I wanted to redirect my fashion frustrations to my feet - it wasn't happening. All that energy got directed to 2 things - getting smarter and getting fatter, but I digress.

It wasn't until last year that I lost enough weight for my feet to shrink to a size 11 (either that or manufacturers started making size 11s larger). I could even fit into a size 11M in some high end shoes (Sesto Meucci - I love you!).

My love for shoes is much like my love for clothes...so many years I was denied fashion cuz it wasn't available in my size. Slowly but surely, it's coming into reach...

Until then, I am content to oogle...come hither heels (aka f*ck me shoes) , career girl pumps, and other goodies.

Morbid Obesity

Was trolling weight loss blogs because I needed some inspiration when I came across this.

All I can say is "Amen"!

Worth a thousand words...

(For those not in the know - it's Mychal Bell)

Regeneration properties of the human body

I have pierced ears...have had them for almost 30 years. Never in the history of my pierced ears have my holes started to close - until today. It was the oddest thing. I went to put earrings in this morning and the right one wouldn't go through. So I used a little force and broke through the skin.

I cannot believe that my holes started to close. I figured after 30 years, those bad boys should be like 7-11..

On the other hand, for the first time in my life, I have acne marks. I've been a wee bit stressed lately and have had random unfortunate whiteheads appear here and there. I invested in a comedone remover and followed the instructions - and it still left a dark spot. So I decided to leave the next one be and just slather it with pimple cream...it disappeared in 2 days...but still left a dark spot. My previously even toned skin now has 3 dark spots from acne! According to some info I read, it takes 6 weeks for them to fade. Time is ticking....

Speaking of fading...I was viciously attacked by a rather ornate metal trashcan. It happened while I was cleaning up the library at Oma's house. It left a little slice on my big toe. That was about three weeks ago. I still have a dark spot on my toe - a scar.

I'm sure by now, you're probably like "WTF?".

See, I don't have a history of scars. In my 30+ years on this earth - I have accumulated very few dermatological anomalies:
1. A reminder from when I put a body part through a storm window
2. A reminder from when I tripped at the gas station
3. A reminder from the 2006 car accident (which I'm still not sure how that occurred cuz I had no injuries)
4. A reminder from my youth when I accidentally stuck a pencil in my body and broke off the lead

That's it.

Now, I haven't lived a sheltered life...I've traversed jungles in Africa (literally), explored a forest in South America (literally), played TWO YEARS of rugby, logged hours on the playground chasing the nieces most fab, walked into walls (I was sober, I just had some depth perception issues) and 4 dermatological anomalies is all I have to show for it.

So this recent outbreak of marks is quite unsettling.

In the grand scheme of things,I know that this ish is nothing. I just needed to vent.

As you wish

Wow, I can't believe it's been 20 years . Cary Elwes definitely had swagger back then.

Perspective

In January 2006, I was in a car accident. I was on my way to church on a Sunday morning. Happy because I had just accepted an offer with the company. I was graduating in 4 months, had a good job with a good company, had lost a bit of weight...life was grand. Out of nowhere, I spun out on the highway. It was a dry day and I had driven this stretch for 2 years without incident. Fortunately, there were no other cars on the highway at this time. It seems like so long ago...as I was looking for some pictures of myself eating a donut and thinking "Fat pig", I ran across pictures of the car after the accident. ..




I walked away with no injuries. Was able to go to classes the next day...went on with my life as if nothing happened.

Not sure where I was going with this...but I'm no longer thinking of myself as "Fat Pig"
More like "Super blessed"

Not much

Haven't been blogging much because there's not much going on to blog about. Truly a time of waiting on the job front.

Have been spending a lot of time with Oma. She's the coolest grandmother ever! We've been catching up on our movie watching - last week we saw "Shoot 'Em Up". Probably the best worst movie that I've seen in ages. It's so bad that I have to believe it was made bad on purpose. Paul Giamatti is such a great actor the only way he could deliver that over the top performance is if he purposely did it. He's beyond an ass in this movie. I have the same amount of repulsion (if not a smidge more) for this character as a I did for Jabba the Hutt.

Alfonso...I hardly knew ye

Yes, it's another video.

No, I'm not just posting videos because I've FINALLY figured out the technology.

Anywho...

I had a MAJOR crush on this kid. Even went as far as writing fan letters...and I wasn't a fan letter type girl. My pre-teen mind says he wrote me back. The jaded marketing professional says it was his manager. Either way, I got return letters from Alfonso Ribeiro.

Ahh...those were the days. Silver Spoons, Pepsi Commercials, appearances on the UNCF Telethon...wherever he was going to be on TV, I was watching.

Good thing I didn't see this when I was oh-so-in-love with Alfonso. Not only would I have been disillusioned, I would have been PISSED that my baby sold out to the corporate man for a buck.

Old School Jam

This was my jam.

It's a beautiful day for...

Apple picking. Bike riding in the country. Hiking. A great outdoor festival. A picnic. Playing in the park with a large dog, preferably a Mastiff or a Great Dane.

None of which I'm doing right now because I am proactively preparing for my exodus from this burg. Yesterday was also a gorgeous day, so I decided to visit the farmer's market. True to form, this was overall a monumental disappointment.

I didn't set out expecting for it to be a disappointment. I was really looking forward to the experience. The website made it sound so promising. I love farmer's markets, too. When I got there, all was well - found good parking across the street. Then I went into the market.

Yeah, that's where the dream died. It was half empty - very few vendors. I am not naive enough to believe that all produce at a farmer's market comes from local farms. There are many people there who purchase from wholesalers. Unfortunately, the majority of the vendors at this market did that. However, I ran across a vendor who LIED about it. I asked him if his peppers were locally grown, he said yes. When I picked them up to inspect them - there were stickers that said "Product of Canada". I'm no Ms. Teen South Carolina. I know where Canada is on the map.

But soon enough, I will be in a real city that has multiple REAL farmer's markets filled with local produce....and when there's no farmer's market, there are budget friendly produce stores that offer a better selection at better prices than the local grocery chains.

Back to packing...

Jena 6

Praise God for the overturn.

A collection of stuff

Tooth fairy Part 1:
The eldest NMF lost her first tooth.
"Aunt Dawn, guess what the tooth fairy left me?"
"What?"
"FOUR QUARTERS!!! FOUR QUARTERS UNDER MY PILLOW"

$1.00 for one tooth. I guess that's inflation for ya.

You are What You Eat:
New show on BBCAmerica. This could be a great show if the nutritionist weren't so pissy. The interesting thing is that at the end, the fat folks feel better and look better. Plus they have a better attitude. The host is still pissy.

Take home lesson - 8 weeks of this program will leave you lighter and happy feeling...a lifetime of this program will leave you a shriveled, shrill witchy woman.

Tooth Fairy Part #2:


NMF #1: "Mommy, I saw the tooth fairy. She came in around 11 o'clock last night and put the quarters under my pillow. At first I thought it was you, but it was past your bedtime. You go to bed before 11, right Mommy?"

My sister: "Right"

NMF #1:"That's what I thought. I knew it couldn't be you because you would be in bed at that time"

3:10 to Yuma
Go see it this weekend. Christian Bale, men on horses, wonderful chase scenes, suprising humor and an ending that's so beyond good

If I only had a perm...

For those of you who don't speak Spanish, check out the translation here.

BTW - this is NOT real, it's a clever promo campaign. Although, it looks a lot like some of the shops that I've seen on my travels to developing countries...

Moving on...I'm moving on

Yeah, I know...it's been a minute.

I've been hanging with my fab-u-lous grandmother for a few days. An impromptu vacay from the everyday. We've been having mad fun.

Good news on the job front - a gig in a big city is in the works. I had an in-person interview and the first feedback I got was interesting so my recruiter went to bat for me. Still waiting to hear back from that. Also have an interview soon for another big city gig.

In the meantime, my landlord is having a cow over me moving. He doesn't want tenants moving out from Oct - Jan because that's the hardest time for him to rent - and there's a clause for that in the rental agreement. Plus, even though I'm month to month, there's a 60 day notice clause. Of all of this, the only thing I remembered was that I'm month-to-month. When I e-mailed him that I MAY be moving at the end of September (in a period well normally required for a month-to-month lease), he had a hissy. He went into a panic and it was all very weird.

I totally take the responsibility for not reviewing my rental agreement at the beginning of the job search - that's on me. I approach this as a business transaction. He on the other hand is coming across as if I have done inflicted mortal damage. It's as if he expected me to stay in that apartment forever. In June, when I told him that I left [former company], I also told him that I would be leaving the city. My mistake - not following up on that conversation with an e-mail message.

No worries - this is not even a blip in the road.