Oh. My. Gawhd.

"Hey Mrs. C, what did you do last night?"

"Oh, you know, just puttered around, did some laundry, did some reading, went to bed."
[Fake answer]

"Oh, you know, I drank wine from a box, ate (No Name!) All Dressed chips and watched 4 episodes of Long Island Medium."
[Fake answer]

" ... I watched six episodes."
[Real answer]

E.T.!

We were so excited to watch E.T. with the girls last night!

My favourite quotes from them:

When the mysterious people were chasing him at the beginning: 

"What the? E.T. is just a harmless alien! A misunderstood creature!"

When they were doing the big 'flying bike ride scene':

"E.T.  must be like, 'Huh? I was just dead, and now I'm flying in a bike basket!"

So it all went well--until the end, when one of the girls (along with her mother) was reduced to a sobbing mess. I thought maybe we broke her, but she eventually pulled herself together. She may look just like Pop, but she definitely got my tendency to cry at everything. I'd better warn her now about the Christmas commercials coming out soon...

Bad ways to start the day

1. Doing the Jillian Michaels thing. I mean, it's a good thing, but I hate every minute of it.
2. Reading an email title from Chatelaine as "Best fish faces" and thinking 'what the heck is a fish face?' Then re-reading the email an hour later and realizing that it is actually an article about the "best fish tacos" which makes more sense. Not a LOT more sense, but more. This means that my eyes are totally crapping out on me. The other day I read a line as 'cinnamon mistakes that people make.' Now, I've misread many a recipe, and probably have made a few cinnamon mistakes in my life, but this title actually said 'common mistakes that people make.' Like refusing to admit that they need to wear their glasses all the time now.
3. Having a Meat Loaf song inexplicably stuck in my head. And it's not even Paradise By The Dashboard Light. It's "You took the words right out of my mouth. It must've been when you were kissing me." So not only is it a really terrible song, but it's a lyric that actually makes me want to vomit.

It's time to play the music

K is dressing as a dog for Halloween.

She put the costume on tonight, and then sat down at the piano to play Alouette for the six thousandth time.

Then she suddenly yelled "Mummy! Come look! I'm Rowlf from The Muppet Show!"

Once again, rightly or wrongly, I took this as a sign that I'm a good parent.

And now, in honour of this, please enjoy this video from The Muppet Movie. Because then I will also know that I'm a good friend and blogger.

My name is Mrs. C, and I wear scarves

So, I jumped on the band wagon and wore a decorative scarf with my outfit yesterday.

It went well, I'd say.

So well, in fact, that I'm doing it again today*.

(Note: the scarf was purchased on the same day that I decided to try the 'sweater and leggings' look, just to see once and for all if that was a trend I could join. The answer was a resounding no. Truly, I have passed my 'best before' date for leggings. So I bought the scarf in a last-ditch attempt to look like I'd entered a store in at least the last two years.)

I had expected it to be a very self-consciousness-causing article of clothing, not unlike a hat or a blazer. Whenever I do that, I feel very: "HELLO! I'm wearing a BLAZER!" And my friend J and I have already discussed the Intimidating Hats. I just don't think I'm confident enough to pull off that look.

But yes, I'm embracing the scarf thing.

I just hope people don't think I'm a man--because I know whenever I see a lot of scarf action, my first move is to look for an Adam's apple.




*Different scarf, found in my closet. Why was it there? When did I buy it? I DON'T KNOW!

More words of wisdom

If any of my words live on forever, let it be this very specific piece of advice:

Do not attempt level two of Jillian Michael's 30 Day Shred DVD the day before you drive on the 401 for the first time.

Because level two of Jillian Michael's 30 Day Shred DVD is the level where she inexplicably adds the plank pose to all three circuits of the work out.

And when you're driving on the 401 for the first time, after doing level two of Jillian Michael's 30 Day Shred DVD, you will become progressively more convinced that you are having a heart attack from the stress of driving when, in fact, you just have sore pecs from doing the $*#@ing plank pose.

Break out the rosaries

I have mentioned before that there are a few things I don't do/haven't done which prevent me from feeling like I'm actually a grown up:

• wearing makeup
• drinking coffee
• driving on a 400 series highway

Well, buckle up kiddies, because tomorrow I'm driving to (North of) Toronto!

You have to know that only a monumental occasion would merit such an event.

Like going to see the Go-Go's with A at CasinoRama.

The driving fast and straight part doesn't stress me out, it's the merging that kind of makes me want to vomit in terror. I'll be screaming 'let me in let me in let me in let me in' in the exact same tone as Marge screaming 'let me off' in the clip below:

But I'm embracing the whole experience. Because frankly, I've just let this go on too long and it's become too big of a deal.

So say a rosary for me as I head out tomorrow morning. 

I'm considering putting on a full face of drag queen makeup and grabbing extra large triple triple and just getting it all over with at once.

Apparently he has no idea, either

So the other night I was upstairs in our room reading War and Peace...

I'm kidding, I was reading Entertainment Weekly.

...when I smelled something burning.

DH was in the basement working on his train set. (Ooops, did I just out him as a train geek? Sorry, sweetie!) This often involves soldering or what have you, so I wasn't too concerned.

But then the smell didn't go away.

After about 10 minutes, I finally decided to go downstairs and see what was up.

On the main floor there was definitely a haze in the air.

And when I got to the basement....well, I couldn't have timed it any better. DH was backing out of the room he was working in, carrying a bag of garbage, and I could see that the room was filled with smoke. So as he carefully sneaked out of the room and quietly closed the door, he turned around and saw me standing there.

"What's up?"

"Nothing. Nothing.  Just....a little fire."

I'm still fuzzy on the details, but it involved something about ionized alcohol (is that a thing?) and alcohol-soaked rags, and things igniting very quickly. Ask to see the melted spot in the carpet the next time you stop by.

I would just like to state for the record that I did not flip out at any time during this conversation.

I know!

Because I was too busy laughing.

I don't know what my favourite part was...

• The aforementioned perfectly timed entrance
• The fact that he admitted to lighting the Bath and Body Works candle in an attempt to cover up the smell of smoke
• The fact that I eventually noticed he was only wearing one sock (because the other one was ruined when he was stamping out the fire)
• Or his response the next morning when I said, "Remember last night when you almost burned the house down? Were you scared?" 

DH: "Just scared you'd find out."

Ew. And true.

Brushing one girl's hair last night and got to a grody knotted part.

Me: Ew, sweetie, you need to have a shower. I think there's some food in here! And maybe some sneeze, too!

She nodded, and added thoughtfully:

"Yeah. Probably from the same time."

Good thing to consider

DH was talking to the girls about first names and last names the other night.

DH: "Girls, when you get married, will you change your last names?"

E: <thoughtful pause> "Well, that depends."

DH: "On what?"

E: "Well, like, if the guy's name is Johnny Eyeball or something, then no, I probably won't."

Zoom zoom

I drove to work way too fast yesterday.

I blame this on the fact that I heard Live And Let Die (Sir Paul, not Axl), followed by Middle Of The Road by The Pretenders.

If it catches you in the right mood, you can't help but get swept up in the grandeur of Live ... Well, except for the ragga part, but really, that's only, what 4 bars? Barely enough time to take your foot off the accelerator.

And then Middle Of The Road! Quite enjoyed it, trucking along...until she got to:

I'm not the cat I used to be
I've got a kid I'm thirty-three

Even as we approached that lyric, I kind of hoped that it was 'I've got a kid I'm forty-three'. But I knew in my heart she was going to say thirty-three.

And I remembered singing along with that song, all those years ago, thinking 'yeah, I'm sure she would be tired as hell, thirty-three is really old.'

Luckily I accelerated through my shock, instead of slamming on the brakes in disgust, and still made it to work in record time. Not bad for an old lady.