Awards You Wish Your School Gave 2011-2012

Posted on May 22, 2012 by snarkyinthesuburbs

Thank you everyone for your fabulous nominations. After reading all of them I have to say there are a lot of pissed off parents out there!  A special Snarky shout out to all the teachers and school board members who shared their nominations with me. I’ve tried to include as many as I can and I’m currently pondering the possibility of doing a Volume 2. 

The Pulling A Putin Award goes to the PTA, PTO, PT Whatever, President that can’t seem to deal with the jarring reality of not being Commander-in-Chief of her child’s school Parent/Teacher group.  This person will go so far as to rewrite bylaws to ensure she stays in her position of power.  If all else fails and she’s forced to surrender her sacred notebook she somehow manages to ensure that her BFF is the new President for the next year therefore establishing a puppet government where she’s still pulling all the strings. You can bet your cookie dough fundraiser that as soon as her besty’s term is up this gal is tan, rested and ready for another term as President.  This award also comes with a doctor referral to seek immediate help at the nearest mental health facility.  Anyone who would want to serve consecutive terms as a PTA president qualifies for a competency hearing.

Parking Pin Head Award is presented to an elementary school secretary in East Texas who not only breaks the law every morning by not yielding the right of way.  She also consistently exceeds the speed limit and insists on crossing 2 drop off lanes to get to, where else, but the closest parking space to the front entrance to the school.  While she is doing this she ups the ante by flipping the bird to parents who roll down their window and shout “slow down” or “be careful.”  The person who nominated this paragon of stupidity enclosed an email sent to the school principal about the “problem.” The principal’s response expressed no concern for student safety, but instead chose to focus on that the email had “hurt his secretary’s feelings.”  For that the principal receives a Commendation for Stupidity in the form of a pink slip.

Disappearing Volunteer Award is conferred on all those moms who sign up for everything and do nothing.  You can see them on back-to-school night scribbling their name on every volunteer sheet.  For some reason these moms gravitate to volunteering for the school fundraisers. They like to boast about their connections, name dropping like a fool, sharing their over-the-top ideas, and flexing their fundraising prowess like a stripper working a greased pole at 1 buck Beer Night.  What usually happens is these moms after getting past the initial meet and greet meeting stage and entering the “you have to produce some results” arena become incognito.  Blaming work or family they ride off into the sunset leaving some committee member to clean up their mess.

The Passive Aggressive Parent Award is bestowed on those special few who fancy themselves super sweeties. They think they are just outrageously nice people who really, really care about the school and therefore believe that entitles them to send out the most vicious emails in the history of self-expression.  Apparently they think it’s okay to write anything they want as long as one paragraph ends with the word Hugs with a smiley face icon or a “I don’t mean to upset you, but I just knew you would want to know” even better is the  “I didn’t mean to throw you under the bus, but…”  To all these parents your P.A.P. award is engraved with the following: “For Being a Huge Ass Hat – We Knew You Would Want to Know.”

Possip gets the Annoying Word Award.  Legions of parents are now urging us to possip (spreading positive talk) instead of gossip. The problem is that people are confused about what defines gossip.  Gossip is not a group of people sharing factual data about what went down in a PTA meeting that puts you in a bad light.  That’s called the truth.  Deal with it.  You can’t possip your way out of being an idiot.

The Take a Chill Pill Bitch Award is granted to on all those anal retentive mothers who see a class party as a way to stake their claim on maternal greatness.  Honorable mentioned to the mom who 10 minutes before a party handed out 2 pages of single spaced instructions to the other mother volunteers on how to run a tissue paper snowball relay race. First Runner Up is the mother who chose to have the class party catered and then presented each parent with their “share of the bill.”

Parent Who Does Their Child’s School Project Award goes to the dad in my section of the burbs who built his child a life-size mastodon tusk.  The children (not the parents) were supposed to construct small models of a tusk with either clay, styrofoam or paper mache.  This dad went all out and built a 14 foot tusk.  You should have seen him at school drop off.  The tusk was so big it was hanging out of the bed of a pick up truck.  When the dad parked and grabbed that faux pre-historic projectile he couldn’t have been more proud.  You would have thought he was hoisting his penis instead of paper mache. He stopped traffic in the drop off zone and was all smiles bringing that big boy into the building.  Sadly, the dad must have experienced a little shrinkage when the teacher told him, “There was no room in her class for a tusk of such majestic proportions.”  Oops.

Worst Mom Outfit of the 2011-12 School Year goes to the hot mom in Florida who tattooed eyes on the top of her breasts. The alert Snarky reader who nominated the Seeing Eye Boob describes it this way. “ There’s one eye on the edge of each boob, with the cleavage line being where a nose would exist. Really there aren’t words to do them justice. She wears scoop-neck tops or tank tops and it’s just these eyes staring at you! No way to not stare back at her cleavage! I swear she could probably hypnotize someone (at least men) with those things!”  ( Click here for visual.  Warning it’s scary.)

The worst hot mom accessory this year is the mini bar narrowly beating out the Do It Yourself Vajazzle Kit.  Shout outs to the Cali mom who travels on field trips with her own bedazzled portable mini bar to “deal with the stress on the bus.”

Stay classy parents.

Thanks for your input friends.  Feel free to leave more nominations in the comment section and share this Snarky post with the world.  Just think one of our award winners might just read about themselves. Wouldn’t that be delicious?  Be sure to like me on FB to stay up-to-date on the Snarky.

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Partly Cloudy With A Chance of Dumb Ass – Part 6

Posted on May 10, 2012 by snarkyinthesuburbs

Finally the freaking part about the cops

I spent the remainder of the week counting the days until Barbara got home.  According the neighbor “keeping an eye” (and just between us she was doing a mighty poor job) on Barbara’s house she was scheduled to be back in town on Monday. I hadn’t been this excited since I found six sleeves of Girl Scout Thin Mint cookies hidden in the back of my freezer under a 5 pound bag of Trader Joe’s Chicken Won Tons.  On Barbara Eve, or as some of you may call it Easter, I woke up, pilfered candy from my kids’ Peter Cottontail Hopping Down the Bunny Trail baskets and got attitude from my husband about his Easter present. He’s all, “Classy, really classy” because I gave him a “Bitch Basket” for Easter. I got a 72 rolls of toilet paper package from Costco and used it as the base for the bitch basket and then added 10 chip clips, 2 fingernail clipper sets, scissors and a lint roller – all the stuff he’s always bitching about as in; “Where’s the toilet paper?”  “Why can’t I ever find a chip clip?”  “Who took the scissors?” I thought is was inspired. Who wouldn’t’ like 72 rolls of toilet paper? And it was Charmain Ultra Soft.  It’s not like I went Walmart house brand on him.

To escape his negative vibe I took my dogs for a walk before I got dressed for church.  As I turned the corner with my hounds I was greeted by the Super Family’s Easter Banner (Please if you haven’t read about the Super Family stop and do so right now.) on their side fence.  It proclaimed “Kendell Family Easter Egg Hunt – Who Will Find the Golden Egg?!”  Gag.  Thanks to Kevin Kendell, a petite, hairless man who resembles a turkey baster and is always dressed in bike shorts and a spandex tank top with his erect man nipples in a constant state of thrust,  four years ago the town had to abandon it’s 43 year tradition of a local Easter Egg hunt.  Kevin went on a search and destroy mission that I’m sure far surpassed WWII troops storming the beaches at Normandy to guarantee his kids Kelsey, Kaleb and Kacey found the most eggs.  Because of his special forces tactics a couple of kids were trampled and that escalated to five dads getting into a shoving match that some off duty firemen had to break up.  After that incident, the Kendell’s have hosted their own private, invitation only, Easter Egg hunt where the eggs are not filled with anything as bourgeoisie as candy. No, these eggs are stuffed with cash. The Golden Egg is the one with two $100 bills.   As you may have guessed the Snarky family has yet to receive an invitation to this Easter Egg Hunt.  After I pass the obnoxious sign I see Kevin’s bike short butt bending over as he hides eggs in preparation for the hunt.  I pick up my walking pace so I’m not forced to so much as make eye contact with him.

Twenty minutes later I get home from walking the dogs and as I’m unleashing my part beagle, part basset hound mutt (Oreo) I get a present.  Oreo opens her mouth and drops a plastic yellow Easter Egg at my feet.  This dog loves to pick up items on our walks, specifically golf balls and surprise you with her treasure when she gets home.  I have a drawer full of lovely Titlest balls that my special friend has picked up for my husband.  When I see the plastic yellow Easter egg my only thought is does it have candy and if so I wonder if any dog slobber has managed to permeate the candy’s wrapper?  I open the egg and two $100 bills fall out.  Oreo had found the Golden Egg!  Good dog Oreo.  Good dog.

I know what you’re thinking.  I should march right over to the Super Family and return their egg. It is after all one of the holiest days in the Christian faith.  Well, I decided on another course of action.  I went Old Testament with finders keepers losers weepers.  Oh, calm down, I didn’t keep the cash and put it in my emergency Diet Coke and hair highlight fund I took the two crisp one hundreds and placed them in the church offering plate when they were doing a special Easter collection for Haiti.  My husband raised his eyebrows when he saw me peel off the cash, but he didn’t say anything.  He saved that for five hours later.

That’s because five hours later I had a policeman knocking on my front door.  You can imagine how excited this made my entire family.  I told everyone to calm down.  It’s not like we haven’t trained for this.

“Everyone,” I snapped, “Man your battle stations. This is not a drill.”

By that I meant for my husband to get his phone and prepare to speed dial our attorney and for my kids to take their positions at the upstairs windows to record what was going down with their phones.  I may need it for the trial.

“Remember,” I told my kids, “I want one of you getting the close-ups and one of you keeping steady on the wide shot. Don’t go all fancy camera moves on me.”

I was in luck when I opened the door and saw it was the SRO (School Resource Officer) as the cop of the day.  Officer Matt did the DARE and Safety programs at the Elementary and Middle School. He must have drawn the short straw by getting Easter Sunday duty.  The good news for me was over the years I had developed a congenial relationship with the young police officer.  I’m about to give you newbie parents some great advice here so get ready to take notes -  When your kids start school you will, of course, give the teachers gifts, but it’s more crucial to gift the support staff.  School secretary, librarian, custodial and even the SRO were recipients of my gratitude for all they did.  This is why as soon as I got my door opened I gave Officer Matt a great big hug, asked about his mother and offered him a piece of pie and then asked him why he was paying me a visit.

Blushing and slightly stammering he said, “Your neighbor thinks you may have stolen $200 from him.”

“Do you mean my neighbor who is trying to hide himself behind my oak tree, that one?”

Officer Matt looks over his shoulder and says, “Yes, that one.”

“Do you know why he would think that?”

“Sir,” he shouts to Mr. Super Family, “Please come here.”

Mr. Super Family struts over in his spandex and says, “All I know is that I’m missing my golden egg and the only person I saw when I was hiding my eggs were you and your dogs.”

I look at Officer Matt and can see that he’s having trouble keeping a straight face and say, “Wow, the Case of the Missing Golden Egg.  It’s like Encyclopedia Brown Meets Mother Goose.  How exciting. “

Mr. Super Family gets all up in my face and says, “Yeah, well it’s still stealing.”

“Golly Kevin, anybody or even an animal could have picked up an egg.  You have your great big sign up bragging how the eggs are stuffed with money and I also believe you put it on your family Facebook fan page.”

(That’s right, I said fan page.  The Super Family is so super that they attempt to share their greatness with a worldwide audience.)

“What a minute,” Officer Matt says to Mr. Super Family, “It’s common knowledge that you hide eggs with money in them all over your yard.”

“Yes”

“When did you post it on Facebook that you had eggs with money in them in your yard?”

“I don’t know about 7 hours ago. “

“And,” I say, “How do you even know your golden egg is missing?”

“Because, the egg hunt is over and no one found the golden egg.”

“Well, did you consider that one of your children or guest found the egg and took the cash and didn’t want to tell anyone. Maybe they were afraid they would have to share it.  Seriously, I can think of about a thousand scenarios on how that egg could have gone missing.  Even, maybe that a dad of one of those kids you trampled four years ago in the city Easter Egg hunt might have taken it.”

Officer Matt’s face turns angry and he says, “That was you four years ago?  Not cool man, not cool.”

While I’m looking at Mr. Super Family I ask Officer Matt, “Is there any kind of legal recourse I can take for having a neighbor call the cops and accuse me of stealing on Easter no less.?”

Officer Matt smiles and says,”I’m sure there’s at the very least some kind of harassment charge you could file.”

“Hmm,” I say, “I’ll consider taking that under advisement with my legal counsel.”

Officer Matt looks at Mr. Super Family and says, “Sir, I’m afraid you have no complaint here. The egg could still be in your yard or one of your teenagers could have “borrowed” it.”

That was enough for Mr. Super Family to walk back to his yard with his tail between his bike shorts.

Before Matt could turn and leave I reach out and touch his elbow and ask if he could answer a question for me.

“Sure, What is it?”

“Well, it’s about something growing in my neighbor’s yard. I think it maybe cannabis sativa.”

Now that got his attention.

The Conclusion

Finally, the day had come for Barbara to return home.  I’m sure she thought the manure smell would have dissipated and she would pull into her driveway secure in the knowledge that she bested me and all was right in her well-ordered lawn dominatrix world.  Sadly for Barbara as she turned the corner and veered into the winding road that would lead to her cul-de-sac she was greeted with a yard still sprinkled in cow crap with tiny little seedlings of clover and dandelion proudly peeking out of the soil.  Waiting for her in the driveway was the raccoon condo better known as the 1975 AMC Pacer mating with the rusted, bullet bedazzled tin trailer.  Five strong stalks of a dioecious flowering cannabis herb were gently swaying in the late afternoon spring breeze.  The sixth stalk having been removed by a law enforcement officer on Easter Sunday.

In preparation for this moment I had stayed home all day and had my ears on high alert for screams of anguish.  As luck, or the fact that I spent most of my day outside scanning the street for Barbara’s car would have it, I was able to witness the moment when she arrived back to her lair.  Due to the AMC Pacer and trailer taking up her entire driveway she had to park on the side of the street.  She threw open her car door, her wedge heeled sandal feet ran up the sidewalk and she was screaming, “Whose car is this!  Whose car is this!” She stuck her head inside the windowless Pacer and then bolted across the street to the neighbor who had been put in charge of watching her home.  The neighbor comes out to her front porch and Barbara begins screaming 20 Questions – Whose car is that?  Why is it in my driveway?  She had yet to notice her lawn had been infiltrated with grasses that didn’t answer to the name of Kentucky Blue or Rye.  After Barbara had browbeaten the neighbor into crying she whipped out her cell phone and called the police.  It took all of 5 minutes for the cops to arrive.  It took 7 before a crowd gathered and only 8 before the President of the HOA walked by.  I entered the fray at about 9 minutes in.  The police had a problem calming her down especially after they pointed out she had marijuana growing in her flower beds.

Lord, she was a very unladylike cursing tornado belching the F word like a drunken frat boy. After I soaked up the spectacle for a few minutes I felt the need to step in.  I said, “Excuse me officers, but if she really doesn’t know where the Pacer and trailer came from I could call a tow service for her, but it might be a couple of hours before they could get there. (I didn’t want the non-profit I volunteered for to lose out on a donation so I had always planned after I tweaked Barbara with the car visual to have the two junk heaps hauled off.)  Also, I’m sure that weed is just pure nonsense. This woman, although she swears like she’s giving birth to a 14 pound baby without an epidural and recovering from an episiotomy that was done with a spork, is a pillar of the community and co-chair of the Lyric Opera Guild Gala 2012 – An Enchanted Evening.”

One of the police officers looks at me and says, “We figured the weed wasn’t hers. It’s not something you would usually grow in the front of your house and it’s hard to prove who planted the pot. Was it the original owner of the home? Was it airborne seed?  We just need it eradicated.  Oh and thanks for the offer of the tow truck,” he pauses and looks over at Barbara who is now sitting down in her manure yard in white linen pants with her head between her legs taking deep breaths and says to her, “You know lady you’re mighty lucky to have such a great neighbor.”

Barbara lifts her sweaty, make up stained face up at me and I smile and say, “Oh, officer I would do just about anything for her.”

Epilogue:  By dinner time the Pacer and trailer had been towed off to the junk dealer’s lot and the pot was history. Last weekend Barbara began the process of having her entire lawn ripped out and re-sodded in an attempt to rescue her virgin grass from the virulent soil combatants that the manure had “released.” She’s currently in the process of  appealing her HOA death sentence and has secured an attorney in her quest to reclaim Yard of the Month privileges.  All of this has left her with no time to mess with me or anyone else in the neighborhood.  We’re all enjoying leaving our garage doors open, not mowing our grass in a cross hatch pattern and using yard decor that is not from Barbara sanctioned places like Frontgate or Pottery Barn.  On occasion, when Mr. Super Family is out in his yard, I especially like to play fetch with my dogs by throwing yellow plastic eggs for them to retrieve.  I’m sure he loves to hear me say, “Good doggies, now go get that golden egg.”

____________________________

**Many thanks for all of you who “liked” me on Facebook!  May the Snark Be With You.  For those that haven’t done the deed yet to stay up-to-date on new posts and take part in my not so deep thoughts click on this Facebook link - http://is.gd/iEgnJ (That’s the abbreviated link to my FB page) or I twitter @snarkynsuburbs.   Thanks also to all the Pinterest folks that are sharing the Snark. Cheers!


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Partly Cloudy With A Chance of Dumb Ass – Part 5

Posted on May 7, 2012 by snarkyinthesuburbs

Not one to rest on my laurels I was all over another opportunity that presented itself to me later in the day.  I volunteer at a non-profit that takes people’s used cars as donations and then sells the, usually very crapped out, cars to a dealer for cash.   I was working the phones for them when a call came in from a woman who wanted to donate her recently deceased father-in-law’s car.  She sounded very embarrassed about the condition of the vehicle and I assured her we had gotten cars donated that a good junk yard would have turned away.  Her problem was they were about to put her father-in-law’s house on the market and they needed the car out of the driveway as soon as possible.

“The car can’t be that bad,” I said.

“Oh, trust me it is,” the woman replied, “It’s a 1975 rusted out, dented, moldy AMC Pacer with the roof caving in. Oh and raccoons got into a couple of years ago and shredded most of the interior.”

I hope right now you’re thinking what I was thinking because I was thinking – I’ve got to get my hands on that car.  She had me at AMC Pacer.

“That does sound bad,” I said, “But we still would love the donation.”

“Well, there’s one more things. The Pacer has one of those tin can travel trailers attached to it.  The trailer is in worst shape than the Pacer. It even has a couple of bullet holes in it,”

I  gasped in delight, but the woman thought I was gasping about the violence of bullet holes so she quickly said, ‘Oh no, it’s not what you think.  The bullet holes are from a hunting trip when a bunch of men got drunk and used the trailer for target practice.”

I’m thinking to myself, “Awesome!” But I say to her in a voice of sweet innocence, “It’s okay.  I was just taken aback for a minute.”

In a very relieved tone she says,  “I was worried you were going to back out and you still might because the problem is you have to take both the car and the trailer.  You see the tow hitch on the back of the Pacer is so rusted out we can’t get the trailer off.”

“Oh no worries, no worries at all – we’ll take both,” I say as I’m rubbing my hands together in unfettered joy.  Let me ask you something – can your still drive the Pacer?”

“Barely.”

“Well, here’s the deal our parking area where we store the cars before the dealer we sell them to comes and hauls them away is full right now. But, if you could manage to drive the car and the trailer to my house I could store it for you and then when there’s room in our lot we can move it there.”

“Oh Bless you!  You’re an angel.  I’ll get with my husband as soon as I hang up the phone and see about moving the car today.”

I gave her Barbara Gray’s address and told her to make sure to pull the car and the trailer into the driveway as far as it will go.  I also told her I was going to be gone all day so she just needed to leave the key to the Pacer in the front seat of the car since I was pretty sure no one was going to steal it.

By 3:30 that afternoon Barbara had not only six pot plants in her front yard, but the world’s most disgusting AMC Pacer that was being upstaged by a vintage trailer that probably housed meth chefs in a former life, decorated with bullet holes.  I did exactly what you would have done.  I took pictures, lots of them.  Then I called the HOA and requested an emergency meeting.

The Devil’s Minor League – The HOA 

Our HOA board is composed mostly of retired people in very bad moods with control freak tendencies boarding on the psychotic which is why Barbara, as the recording secretary, fits in so nicely.  I think because they’re bored they fill up the days by ensuring their suburban enclave meets their level of perfection.  These folks also love, love, love meetings.  To request an emergency one, I have no doubt, gives them a non-viagra aided climax.  My meeting request was quickly approved and scheduled for 10 a.m. the next day.  I suggested we all meet in Barbara’s yard and added that it wouldn’t be awkward because I knew she would be out-of-town.

As befitting such an important and solemn occasion as an emergency HOA meeting in a neighbor’s manure laden lawn I showed up the next morning dressed in my burb finest – jeans, a T.J. Maxx cashmere twin set with pearls and my hair in a headband. I looked like Hillary Clinton, circa 1992. I carried a basked of mini muffins that I passed around and I also had handouts.  Nothing says I’m a serious person who once worked at an important job a decade ago as color handouts.  My handouts, in extra-large type, thank you very much, for the mature set, listed the HOA “crimes” Barbara had committed including, but not limited to; use of unapproved lawn fertilizer resulting in endangerment of the health of other homeowners, possible growing of illegal vegetation, violation of the parking rules and having a vehicle or lawn ornament that reflects negatively on the beauty of the neighborhood.  I also noted as a HOA board member she should know better.

The board, 4 retired dudes, 2 ladies who lunch and also do hard time as members of the Garden Club and my friend Kelly (Board treasurer. She very nicely left work so she could be there for me. ) were “aghast,” “taken aback” and “saddened” by Barbara’s “egregious” and “blatant disrespect of the covenants of the HOA.”  Kelly was getting me off my game a little bit because she was trying not to laugh and the effort was making her entire body shake. I couldn’t make eye contact with her for fear I would start howling. To try to regain my composure I proposed a moment of silence where we could all reflect or pray, depending on your religious affiliation or lack thereof, for Barbara’s soul.  One gentleman requested we form a pray circle and hold hands.  That pushed Kelly right over the edge.  She got the hiccups from excessive laughter suppression and had to excuse herself to go and get a drink of water. I told everyone the manure smell was most likely causing a partial larynx paralysis.

After the moment of silence the HOA board president opened the meeting up for discussion.  I thought the two garden club groupies would try to have Barbara’s back and might defend her.  I was wrong – kind of – they did  have her back, but it was to stick a knife in it.   They also aimed for her jugular by making a motion for the HOA Death Penalty – Ineligible to participate in Yard of the Month for two years!  They had a quorum and took a vote.  It was unanimous – The Death Penalty wins!  The Death Penalty Wins!  One of the woman wanted to call Barbara and inform her immediately of their decision.  No, no and no, this can’t happen. I don’t want her rushing home.  I need a couple of days for my damn seeds to germinate and those pot plants to take root.  This is when being prepared and forcing yourself to read 13 pages of HOA rules pays off big.

“I don’t think that’s a good idea,” I said, “According to the covenant you have to send the rule violations in writing via registered mail. It would be a flagrant violation of our own policy and might render the charges against Barbara null and void.”

They all agreed and the meeting was adjourned with the president vowing to get the letter written and mailed today.  I waited until everyone left, checked on the pot plants, gave them a little water and then did a happy dance.

But, wait there’s more.


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Partly Cloudy with a Chance of Dumb Ass – Part 4

Posted on May 5, 2012 by snarkyinthesuburbs

I woke up the day after my Water Carnival show down all Zippity-Damn-Doo-Dah. I was confident that Barbara Gray had been vanquished for at least a couple of months.  I held on to that happy thought until 10 a.m. I had dropped my kids off at school, gone to a meeting and was pulling into my driveway when I smelled something God awful.  I put my car into the garage and got out to investigate.  That’s when the full force of the odor  began an assault on my olfactory system.  Imagine the worst dirty diaper you’ve ever changed then multiply that by 1,000. I followed my nose and it took me right to Barbara’s house.  She had a landscape crew literally shoveling shit all over her lawn. They were spreading manure in the flower beds, around her trees and shrubs, even raking it through her grass.  Yes, I know it’s just super environmentally friendly to fertilizer with manure, but Barbara wasn’t just fertilizing she was carpeting her entire yard with bovine refuse.  As I stood in her lawn breathing through my nose a neighbor walked over and said, “This is just horrible!”

“I don’t know how Barbara can stand this,” I said while gagging.  ”Who wants cow poop all over their yard?”

“Oh, didn’t you know?  She’s at her lake house until next week.  I’m supposed to keep an eye on things for her until she gets back.”

“What?!  Barbara has left town and we’re stuck with crapapalooza.”

This whole landscaping with nature’s number 2 got my snarky senses tingling.  Something besides the crap didn’t smell right.  I walked over to what seemed to be the head landscape guy and asked if he knew when the order was placed for the manure spectacular.  He said, they got a call late yesterday afternoon from Mrs. Gray requesting her yard be “liberally fertilized with cow manure.”

“She said she was going green and wanted to experiment with cow manure as a total lawn fertilizer. I told her it was going smell something awful, but she didn’t’ seem to care.”

I stood there and thought, “Well, well, Barbara you think you can one up my Water Carnival with a strategic crap bomb.  We’ll just see about that.”

I thanked the yard guy, sprinted inside my house and then took a couple of minutes to enjoy breathing again.  Once I was no longer light-headed from a lack of oxygen I got on the phone to do some research.  My first call was to the landscaping service Barbara uses.  I identified myself as a writer for the website – I Want Yard of the Month.com. The nice lady that answered the phone seemed thrilled to be talking to a “journalist.”  Now some of you may remember that I’ve used this whole writer for a website thing before (I Hate People – Part 3) and if you’re thinking I’m lazy because I’m reusing strategy think again.  I use it because it works.  I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again – never underestimate how much people like to talk about themselves or have someone ask their opinion.  I shared with the woman that I was a neighbor of Barbara Gray’s and was fascinated by her use of cow manure as a fertilizer.  I asked if this was a new trend in suburban landscaping.

“Oh no, we do use cow manure in flower beds, but this is the first time someone has asked if we could do their whole yard.  It usually isn’t done on the entire yard because of the smell and the neighbor’s complaints.  There are some HOA’s that don’t allow it.”

“Really?  Some HOA’s have a problem with it – interesting.  Now, I haven’t noticed my neighbor using cow manure before.  Do you know why she changed her weed and feed methods?”

“You know I really can’t say.  I do know that her phone call yesterday afternoon took us all by a complete surprise.  It’s was so, how do I say this, so un-Mrs. Gray.  We even tried to talk her out doing manure over her entire yard, but she insisted.”

“She just decided to do it yesterday.  Wow, you guys work fast!  What time did she call?”

“Oh, it was right after 5 o’clock, but Mrs. Gray is one of our best clients so we try to keep her happy.”

“Hmm, I bet you do.  Now, is there a downside to using cow manure besides the odor?”

“Well, if you’re not careful about the quality of the manure you can get what is called weed seed transfer. That’s when the vegetation the cow eats ends up in it’s poop and those seeds can then end up in your yard.”

Upon hearing this my heart skips a beat and I experience the thrilling rush of retaliation. I try to contain my joy and say in a voice that’s as normal as possible, “How devastating. You mean if you’re not careful you could end up with a yard full of weeds?”

“Yes, there’s a chance that might happen, but then most people don’t use cow manure all over their yard.”

I thank the landscape lady profusely for her time and promise to send her a link to my article just as soon as I post it online.  I then quickly call my neighbor who is keeping on eye on Barbara’s house for her and ask if she knows exactly when Barbara will be back.  I find out she’s gone for an entire week.  Excellent.  I then change into my navy blue capri track pants, throw on a t-shirt, shove my size 11 feet into men’s flip flops (They’re way cheaper people.) and head to our city’s one and only organic nursery.  I was off to buy some seeds.  Why organic you ask?  Because I wanted to buy dandelion seeds and I knew the organic nursery stocked them for the deluxe crunchy set who make their own home-grown dandelion wine. (Yuck.) I was planning on liberating some dandelion seeds right into Barbara’s yard and that was just the beginning.

Field of Dreams

I was greeted by a very attentive garden employee. She was named Saffron Luna and of course, that prompted me to ask if that was the name on her birth certificate.  It was not.   I told her I was helping my daughter with a school project and she had to see which kind of weeds would grow fastest in a manure based soil.  Saffron was full of great suggestions. While dandelions were a no brainer she also suggested thistles, something that was a cousin to crabgrass, clover, chickweed and various nut and onion grasses.  Unfortunately, all they sold were the dandelion seeds, but she know the local Ag Extension office (for you big city types the Ag office in the simplest terms is a cooperative education outreach for farmers) would have some, if not all of, the weed seeds.  Mother Nature had my back because not only was the Extension office more than happy to load me up on “lawn combatants” they also didn’t charge me a thing.  The gentleman there said, “He was pleased to help any youngster with a scientific endeavor.”

Yeah, I know I should have at least blushed or hung my head in shame for fibbing, but I had bigger issues at stake than the truth – revenge.

The trip out to the country and back took up most of my afternoon and I barely was on time picking up my kids from school.  I warned them as they exited the car to use their backpacks to cover their face and not to commence breathing until they were inside the sealed pod that is our house. Based on the fact that, at times, they’re both morons they didn’t obey me and I was serenaded with my daughter screaming, “My eyes are bleeding!” and my son moaning “It’s the Killing Fields!”  To punish them for not doing as they were told I ran into the house and locked the door making them beg for mercy before I would open it. They were locked out for all of 30 seconds, but you would have thought both of them were having limbs amputated.  After they calmed down and did a nasal wash I explained that Operation Retribution was in high gear.  This is when I was betrayed by my own flesh and blood.  My daughter had the nerve to announce, “Mom, this is all your fault! If you hadn’t made Mrs. Gray so mad with the Water Carnival we could all breathe outside.”

My son added, “I would think about doing Operation Give Up because not being able to go outside or open your windows trumps water balloons.”

I shook my head in disgust and said, “Really, this is what you two are all about – giving up, quitting, hugging defeat.  I’m seriously doubting that you two are my children.  There must have been some kind of switched at birth at the hospital because anyone with my DNA surging through them would not be this lazy. Oh my God, or worse, you both are acting just like Nana!  This isn’t the time to quit.  This is the time to shine.  To let your opponent know just what they’re dealing with.  I telling you two, I‘ve got this.”

Then I misquoted Winston Churchill (big time) and made, what I thought was a stirring closing argument.

“We shall fight her in her yard, We shall fight her in the HOA, We shall fight her in the fields and in the streets, We will outlive the menace of tyranny, if necessary for years, if necessary alone.”

As usual they were not impressed, but I tell you, I gave myself chill bumps.

Before the Dawn’s Early Light

At approximately 3:45 a.m. my alarm went off and I got out of bed ready to begin phase one of Operation Retribution.  Because I had slept in my super sexy nighty – an XL man’s black Hanes T-shirt – I already had on most of my camouflage outfit. All I needed to do was pull on my track pants, lace up my tennis shoes, leash up our black dog and I was good to go.  I slipped out of the house with a dog poop bag filled to the brim with the lawn combatants and then using my elderly dog with bladder control issues as an excuse to be roaming the neighborhood at such an early hour I set out for Barbara’s yard.  Once I got there I began pouring seed from the poop bag into nice little rows.  I felt like a 21st Century Johnny Appleseed.  Everything was going great until something touched my shoulder.

“Holy Crap!, I whispered screamed,  ”Who sneaks up on a woman in the middle of the night?”

“Sorry,” said my 60ish down the street neighbor said. He was smoking and I guessed that’s why he was up.  I knew his wife didn’t allow him to smoke in the house.  “I was just so curious about what you were up to I had to come and take a look-see.”

Hmm, what to do, what to do.  Should I confess the truth or try to cover up my actions?  My neighbor, James Robert, is a retired English professor. He’s got a cool, aging hippie vibe.  He and his wife do new age things like travel the world watching sun sets while doing yoga on top of a mountain.  He’s also pretty attractive for an older gentleman.  Not NCIS Mark Harmon attractive, but really who is?  I decide to go with confessing. Barbara has given him plenty of grief over his xeriscaped yard so I knew there was a good chance he would be all over my plan.  I would also throw in that I was just giving karma a nudge.  So, I spilled the beans/seeds.

As soon as I’m done he starts laughing his ass off.  He’s so loud I’m shushing him, like I need more neighbors outside – not.  After he calms down James Robert bends down to pet my dog and says, “I think I can help you in this little plan you’ve got going on.”

“Oh, you’re going to help spread the weed seeds?”

“Nay, I can do better than that.  What would you say if I planted some weed?”

I gave him a confused look and said,”Well, I’m already planting weed. I have clover and chickweed and…”

He interrupted me with, “No, I mean real weed.”

I looked at him again, still confused and then I got it, my eyes bigger than the full moon. “Ohhhh, you mean weed, weed, marijuana!  I gasped and said, “You want to plant pot in Barbara’s yard?”

At this point I was experiencing a wide range of emotions from giddy delight to having Mrs. Stick Up Her Butt growing pot in her yard to the fear of being busted.  I can see it now, “Local Mother of Two Arrested in Pot Sting – Feet to Big for Women’s Prison Slippers.”

My delight overtook my fear so I went for the follow-up question. “Just how would you do that?”

“Easy, I might possibly have access to a couple of marijuana plants that perhaps I could put in those front flower beds right over there.”

“Like full size, already grown plants?”

“Yes, full size plants.”

“Okay, I can’t tell you how happy this is making me, but I can’t have any part in being anywhere near marijuana.  If you do this I can not help you. I’m going to have to go all Mission Impossible and disavow any knowledge of your actions.”

“No problem. Give me the rest of your seed bag and take your doggy inside.  I’ll take care of the rest.”

I felt like I was right in the middle of a drug deal or something.  My heart was thumping out of my chest.  “Okay,” I said, very cautiously, “I’ll just drop my bag here and go back to my house.  It was good talking to you. Tell your wife hi for me” and then I turned tail and ran home.

I was extremely worried that I may have crossed a line so I woke up my husband and told him my story.  He looked at me with sleepy, pissed off eyes and first said, “You were out in the middle of the night with seeds in a dog poop bag spilling them on a neighbor’s yard with our dog as your co-conspirator?”

“Yes.”

Then you accidentally meet up with James Robert and he volunteers to plant pot in Barbara’s yard.?”

I’m thinking his grasp of the story is remarkable for someone who just woke up and say, “Yes.”

Did you ask him to do it?  Did you see the plants? Did you see him plant the plants?”

I answered, “No, no and no.”

“Then go to sleep. For all you know he was just yanking your chain and P.S. you’re might need to go on some kind of medication”

“Not going to happen. I don’t think there’s a medication for making someone un-awesome.”

He said, “You do know your awesome is probably a textbook case of crazy,” and then he rolled over and went back to sleep.

I couldn’t. I was too wired from my nighttime excursion.  I got even more excited the next morning when I took my dogs on an early than normal morning walk and saw about half-dozen pot plants standing tall and proud in Barbara’s front flower beds.  Good Lord, he had done it!  Barbara Gray was now a pot farmer.

Yes, there’s still more, much more – coming soon.


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Partly Cloudy With a Chance of Dumb Ass – Part 3

Posted on April 24, 2012 by snarkyinthesuburbs

By the time I had pulled into my garage my kids had been fully briefed on what their responsibilities were.  Time was of the essence.  People would be arriving in minutes.  I was on wine detail which meant taking my Franzi boxed white wine and siphoning it off into a carafe. (Classy, I know.) My daughter was to get into a swimsuit pronto, head to the backyard and start turning on the hoses.  My son was instructed to break out the trebuchet.  That command got him interested. “My trebuchet”, he said excitedly.  ”We still have the trebuchet!  I wonder if it works? Where is it?”

“I dug it out of the deepest corner of the basement and it looks to be in pretty decent shape.  I wheeled it out into the yard.  Go make sure it can still catapult,”

A trebuchet, in it’s simplest terms, is a geeky boy’s best friend when his parents just say no to an air gun. It’s loosely related to a catapult and was used in the Middle Ages to fling projectiles over enemy fortifications.  My son had built a mini-trebuchet in seventh grade using a radio flyer wagon, scrap wood and my gently used Spanx. His trebuchet had amazing accuracy in flinging water balloons and seemed to me to be just the thing for a successful Water Carnival.

As soon as I got the Frenzi into a carafe party helped arrived.  My friends Kelly, Nikki and ABC all walked in with screaming kids that immediately descended into the backyard. (For detailed friend descriptions please read My Friends and really let’s try to keep up on the Snarky.)  I told not yet 30 and gorgeous Nikki, “You’re on kid patrol and I think you know why?”

“I’m guessing it’s because I have the youngest kids,” she said.

“No,” it’s because you walked into my kitchen wearing cut offs and a bikini top.  You’re being punished for being young and beautiful with no visible sign of cellulite or spider veins.

Nikki laughed and said, “Should I wrap a beach towel around myself to make you feel better?”

“No, I’m afraid the damage is already done. My self-esteem will now require a Franzi I.V.”

“And I know how much you’ll hate that,” she said and still laughing walked outside and started running through the Dora the Explorer sprinkler with her two kids.

Kelly looked at me and said,  “I better not get “Annoying Mom” hostess duty again. I always get that.”

I gave Kelly a guilty look and then launched into a pep talk.  “It’s because you’re so good at it.  You can stand there and converse with those women without saying things like “Shut up, please just shut up?”  I can’t do that and we all know ABC sure as hell can’t. Really, you have a talent.  It would be rude of me not to let you use it.”

“Let me get this straight. You’re telling me I have a talent for chatting up obnoxious moms?”

“Yes, you’re a diplomat.  An ambassador.  An envoy bridging the gap between the awesome (I said pointing to the three of us left in the kitchen) and the icky.

“Great,” she said with zero enthusiasm, “It looks like the icky are arriving so it’s off to the backyard for me.”

ABC then quickly volunteered to be the “wine hostess.”

“Just exactly does one do as a wine hostess?” I inquired.

“Easy, I keep the Franzi flowing.”

“How do you know it’s Franzi in the carafe?  It could be something fancy?”

“Seriously, I could smell the Franzi from your driveway?”

“My driveway says boxed wine?”

“No, your driveway says boxed wine with a coupon.”

I smiled and said, “You got that right!” and gave her a high-five.  ABC grabbed the  carafe.  I got the plastic wine glasses and the fruit tray and we both headed outside.

It took only about 20 minutes for the Water Carnival to be in full swing.  So many  things were in my favor for a successful event.  It was an unusually hot and humid day and it was way to early for any of the local pools to open so running around in the backyard was still considered not that “uncool” for the over age 9 set.  It was also a Monday.  The one day of the week my kids didn’t have any after school obligations and from the turn out it looked like a lot of families had similar schedules.  But the very best thing about the party was the wind. It was blowing, without any help from me, sprinkler and hose back-splash into Barbara Gray’s yard.   Because my neighborhood has a golf course that runs through it fences are not allowed for any home that backs up to a fairway.  It you do have a fence it must be no taller than four feet and have spacing between the slates to “ensure a seamless neighborhood vista.”  What this means is that while I have a fence, (A white picket one.  Yes, the irony.) Barbara does not and my fence offers no protection from keeping water out of her yard.  To further ensure that her lawn would be a soaking mess I told all the boys under the age of 10 “under no circumstances” should they let water get in “that” yard.  The lady was “very mean and she would get super angry” if her yard got wet.  It was like rubbing a bull’s face in a red flag. Those boys made it their mission to flood Barbara’s yard.

As I stood watching the “moist” mayhem I was forced to play gracious hostess and converse with the three annoying moms I had invited Organica, Zillow and TBTT.  They were here because I had been blowing them off for almost year with one of those, “Yeah, we do really need to get our kids together soon” and they had children who were holy terrors that I knew they would deliver a huge water mess.  I had just broken out the Otter pops and was beginning to circulate them to the kids when “Organica” just couldn’t help herself and had to ask me if the Otter Pops were homemade.  I said, “Um no.”  She then questioned if they were naturally free of additives and part of the Rainforest Alliance Pact?”  It took all the etiquette training my mother had forced upon me and that includes two years participating in Cotillion to not holler, “Are you shitting me?”

Instead I sweetly smiled at her and said, “Oh yes, these Otter Pops are made with amniotic fluid from free range wood nymphs that live in the fair trade enchanted forest and are sweetened with localvore pixie dust.”

You could see Organica trying to process what I had just said.  All the buzz phrases she longed to hear were there – free range, localvoire, fair trade.  It took a couple of seconds before she said a bewildered, “Huh?”

“I’m just teasing you,” I said. “No worries, this brand of Otter Pops are from Whole Foods.”

She smiled and I smiled because the water, high fructose corn syrup and red dye #2 ice pops were from Costco.  But, I’ve learned when a mom questions me about food the simplest way to shut them up is to just say, “Whole Foods.”

Sidebar time – Sorry I know it slows the story down, but I feel I must take a moment to add in this rant.  Curse you Williams Sonoma for taking a simple thing of summer beauty like a box of popsicles that cost me all of $2.00 and ruining it with your $50 Zoku Quick Pop Maker.  It started last summer when every mom was talking about making her own gourmet, organic popsicles for her kids with her Zoku.  As in, “OMG, I just made the best beet juice and carrot Zoku pops ever.”  Gag. Now it’s white trash to grab a 150 count bag of Otter Pops out of your fridge. Frozen ice has gone fancy.  Suburban popsicles are now homemade veggie juices sweetened with stevia.  Way to go, Williams Sonoma.  Thanks for killing another part of the innocence of summer.  Okay, I got that out of my system and I feel way better.  Now, back my story.

The next mom to irritate me was Zillow.  Zillow is a former realtor (brought down by the economic collapse and currently a co-founder of a Cupcakery) who goes around telling everyone what their home is currently worth.  She’s a soothsayer of doom because right now most people’s houses aren’t worth what they should be and really is it ever a good time to tell someone that they’re “this close” to being upside down on their mortgage?  Zillow greeted me with a, “You’ll never sell this house until you get some granite in that kitchen.”

“Good to know,” I said in a curt attempt to shut her up.

It didn’t work. She continued on with, “I don’t even know how you can cook in a kitchen without granite. It’s so 1980′s.”

“Gee Zillow, I’ve probably made thousands of meals in that kitchen without granite countertops. I guess I’m kicking it old school.”

“I’m just saying it’s a shame you can’t go more upscale.”

I thanked her for her concern and immediately walked back into my non-granite kitchen texted my son who was in the backyard and instructed him to trebuchet the woman in the yellow top on the deck with at least two water balloons ASAP. I then took a great big sip of Franzia and counted to 10.  By the time I had gotten to nine I heard screams from Zillow.  The trebuchet had made a direct hit.

I laid low after that happened and busied myself with filling up more water balloons.  Unfortunately TBTT found me.  The TBTT stands for “Too Busy Too Tinkle.”  This woman’s goal is to be the busiest mom in the 48 contiguous United States. She validates her self-worth by being so incredibly, extraordinarily busy (in her own mind) that she has zero time to empty her bladder.  Every conversation I’ve ever had with her starts with some version, “Oh my God. I’m about to wet my pants.  I’ve been so busy I haven’t gone to the bathroom since 6:15 this morning.”   I’ve called her out on this a few times.  I mentioned how it’s not really a good thing not to answer nature’s call and even that it’s a tad awkward to start every conversation with an over share of your bodily functions.  She’s yet to take a hint.  This afternoon she greeted me with, “Girl, where’s your bathroom I’ve got to pee like a racehorse.  I’ve had four coffees, three meetings and no time to go potty.”

I directed her to my half bath and when she came out I began my version of “Word Problems They Didn’t Teach You in School.”  TBTT, I said, I just timed how longed you peed.  It was exactly 46 seconds.  The entire time you were in the bathroom comprised 1 minute and 36 seconds – that includes pants down and up, toilet flush and hand washing.  You mean to tell me that in the, I’m guessing 10 hours you’ve been up, you didn’t have 1 minute and 36 seconds to void your bladder?”

“Oh my God, you timed my pee?  That’s so gross.”

“No grosser then you telling me you have to pee like a racehorse. I’m just trying to help, to illustrate that you do, indeed, have time to use the bathroom.”

“I don’t expect someone like you to get it.  I mean you’d have to be a really busy person to understand what it’s like to be just constantly doing stuff all the time. It’s not just that I don’t time to pee, It’s that I’m so busy I forget that I have to pee.”

I didn’t see myself winning this to pee or not to pee argument so I agreed with TBTT and said, “Yes, you’re right.  I could never grasp being so devoid of time management skills that I couldn’t take a couple of minutes to go to the bathroom. “

She smiled at me and said, “I know, I know, I need to slow down, but it’s who I am.  I’ll sleep when I’m dead.”

“Well,” I said, here’s hoping a bladder infection doesn’t kill you” and off I went to deliver the water balloons to the boys lined up at the trebuchet.

As you would expect of boys as soon as they saw me they attacked me with a water balloons.  I was soaking wet. So I took off my t-shirt and was styling in an outfit of jog bra, capri track pants and flip-flops.  My son yelled, “George Washington, over here. I’ve got something for you” and he handed me a tri-corner hat that he must have snagged from the basement costume stash.  The hat was from his first grade Halloween outfit when he went as Paul Revere. I, being a good sport, perched the hat, sized for a six-year-old, on my head and continued on with my hostess duties.

I walked over to where Nikki, ABC and Kelly (who had escaped the trio of annoyance) were standing and surveyed my yard.  I felt like Francis Scott Key observing the battle of Fort McHenry.  Over the ramparts I watched sprinklers gallantly streaming. There was the rockets wet glare as kids shot each other in the eye with super soakers and the mini trebuchet, courtesy of XL spanx was brilliantly delivering water balloons bursting in not just in the air, but Barbara Gray’s yard. It was a H2o dream come true.  Kids were slip n sliding, bathing in wheel barrows and plastic wading pools, blowing bubbles, and screaming – a lot.  The only thing missing was Barbara Gray, but just as a flock of clouds obscured the sun she emerged out on her back deck, took inventory of the chaos and give me a look, I fear, would have killed a weaker woman.  I looked right back at her, balled my hands into fists, raised them to my eyes and did the whole boo hoo thing.  She just stood there and glared.  I was loving it!  Until my husband pulled into the driveway.  Crap, he was home way early.

My house has the garages on the side so when you pull into the driveway you can see right into a portion of the backyard.  I looked up and there he was sitting in his car staring at me and my what a pretty picture I make.  I’m wet, wearing a child size tri corner hat, in a jog bra with my dimpled stomach, that hasn’t seen the sun since 1995, curling over the waistband of my Target capris.  My handsome husband gets out of his car, briefcase in one hand, keys in the other and continues to stare and then starts shaking his head. What choice did I have, but to blow him a kiss.  He looks at me, kind of smiles and reaches up with his hand that’s holding the car keys and catches it.

This was a definitive moment in my 20 plus year marriage.  I don’t have one of those grand romantic marriages that Nicholas Sparks writes about.  The closest I’ve had to a “Notebook” moment of making mad, passionate love in the rain was when my husband and I snuggled under a large Hefty trash bag during an angry thunderstorm at a University of Texas Football game.  But, the one thing I knew at that moment, on this day, was that I was loved. Not even belly fat and a tri-corner hat scared this man and for a second that made me the luckiest woman in the world.

Too bad that moment lasted just a millisecond because Barbara had left her deck and was walking towards my house with an umbrella.  She demanded the sprinklers be repositioned and all these “shenanigans” stopped.  I said, “No problem, the party is almost over.  I told the boys over and over again to not get your yard wet.  Please accept my sincere apologies,” and then  I offered her an Otter Pop.

She waved her hand at the Otter Pop like it was turd on a stick and squished her way through my very wet grass to her almost as wet backyard. Then right as she’s plopping herself in a chair on her deck the trebuchet launches three balloons. They hit her, not in the face, but right at her feet.  I see the balloons explode, the water splashing up and soaking her linen dress and then to make it even more perfect she curses.  I answer back with an, “Oops, sorry!”

It was a good to be me right up until 10 o’clock the next morning when the shit hit the fan – literally.

More to come.

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Partly Cloud with a Chance of Dumb Ass – Part Two

Posted on April 20, 2012 by snarkyinthesuburbs

I had about three hours to pull off my Water Carnival and I’d like to say thanks to my Snarky FB friends for coming through for me. I had posted what the Yard Terrorist had said and so many of you were forthcoming with great suggestions.  A big Snarky shout out to Carla for her sprinkler placement idea, Tracy for the inspired wildflower seed concept and Heather for the kiddie pool.  More kudos to “How I Learned to Wear a Dress” for the suggestion of soap bubbles.  I’d like to think I would have thought all of this up on my own, but due to the time crunch it was great to have back up.

I’d also like to address what Olga said.  Sweet, sweet Olga counseled me to “Calm down, Snarky – take a deep breath – breathe out – think of 5 things you are grateful for or have been blessed with – and send her forgiveness for her nastiness – we don’t know what it’s like to walk in her shoes.”

To that I say, “No can do.”  Here’s why I don’t believe in that course of action.  I’m a patriot.  This, my friends, is my Boston Tea Party.  I’m protesting tyranny.  Did the Sons of Liberty think of 5 things they were grateful for or blessed with?  Did Sam Adams stand around the Boston Harbor talking to Paul Revere and saying, “Greeting ye fair gentleman let us do a deep exhale and count our blessings.  I, for one, I’m thankful for these knee breeches and my bitching tri corner hat.”

No, this did not occur.  There was not one cleansing breath.  It was all about British ass kicking.  Where would we be if on December 16, 1773  blessings were counted and deep breaths were had?  I tell where we’d be – all of us would be obsessed with the Duchess of Cambridge and driving Range Rovers.  Oh wait, that happens now.  Whatever – the point I’m making is that I live in land of the free and the home of the brave and I pledge allegiance to freedom, and by God, I was going to go get me some!

I went into full hillbilly Martha Stewart mode. First stop my basement to drag out the slip n slide, 2 wheel barrows (the plastic kind that are super deep), old mop buckets, 3 hoses, assorted pool noodles in varying stages of disintegration and a packet of balloons.  I then hauled to the Dollar Store and bought a gallon of bubbles and 2 wading pools.  Next, I worked the phone.  I called my best friends; ABC, Kelly and Nikki, told them about my plan and suggested they bring not only their kids, but their neighbors. I then called moms I, kind of, hate. Let me tell you why and upon reading this it will further document my genius.  I see these women almost everyday.  We have kids in the same class.  They cause me extreme annoyance, yet they invite me into their home so I need to do a little quid pro quo. How could they not feel special being asked to an “impromptu” Water Carnival?  I told them on the phone how I had “been thinking about them and what a beautiful, sunshiny day it was to get our kids together” and then I added “Oh and bring your little ones too.  This will be so great!” The best and most important part – their children are brats to the 10th power, which is perfect.  I wanted the biggest, most obnoxious collection of kids I could find mixing it up in my back yard. Seriously, I would not be happy unless I had at least two kids crying/whining at all times.

After I got off the phone. It was off to the grocery store for an 100 pack of ice pops and an overpriced fruit tray for the Moms. Once I got home I started filling balloons with water, hooking up the hoses and the slip n slide and dragging buckets of hot water from my house to fill up the wading pool and wheel barrows. (Why hot water you ask?  Because kids today are big wussies.  If the water wasn’t warm they won’t stay in the wheelbarrows or wading pools.  I wanted kids in those damn pools.)  With no time to change out of my capri track pants and Target  $5.99 crew neck T-shirt I leapt back in my car, picked my kids up from school and gave them a dossier of what was going down on the ride home including my, I think, brilliant Boston Tea Party analogy. They were kill joys.

My son looked at me, shook his head and said, “You do know that there is no definitive proof that Samuel Adams took part in the Boston Tea Party.”

“Really,” that’s your take away from my stirring let freedom ring speech – a historical correction?”

My daughter chimes in with, “I never understood the whole tea thing?  Who loves tea that much?”

“Oh my God,” I wailed, “ I’m I going to have pull this car over and sing the Star Spangled Banner?  I swear I’ll do it.  You two need to get pumped on being patriots.”

“Yeah, whatever George Washington, I’ve got a ton of homework, so I’ll be going straight to the refrigerator and then my room where I’m locking the door,” says my smart ass son.

My daughter did the 11-year-old girl trifecta of hair flip, eye roll and long drawn out sigh and said, “Seriously, a Water Carnival, what am I five?”

I took a sip of Diet Coke and then begin part two of my scold.  “Did you two have a brainectomy at school?  This is not about a party.  This is about justice.  The party is a means to an end.  I’m not hosting a Water Carnival.  I’m hosting a “Back Off Witch” party.  Summer’s just around corner if I don’t deliver a stern reprimand to this woman who knows what anguish will await us. I’m deeply disturbed you can’t see that.  The whole Island of Misfit Inflatables thing back in December bought us almost 6 months of Barbara Gray going into hiding.  Now, she’s back and we’ve got to take her down.

My son spoke first.  “Okay, okay I see your point.  I sure don’t want to be chewed out by Mrs. Gray for not mowing our yard in one of those cross hatch patterns.”

My daughter says, sighing again, “I’ll do your party as long as I get to be charge of the water balloons.”

Finally I got my kids – the world’s lamest patriots on board.  It was now time to load the water cannons.

More Coming Soon

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Partly Cloudy With a Chance of Dumb Ass – Part 1

Posted on April 19, 2012 by snarkyinthesuburbs

I do a lot of things I’m not very proud of.  The good news is I have, what I consider to be, a gift of being able to justify my bad behavior.  Earlier this month I went on what could be called a HOA crime spree.  I dampened neighborhood property without verbal permission or written permit.  I trespassed.  I illegally parked a three-ton vehicle with an attached trailer and I committed larceny with intent to permanently deprive.  Am I a bad person?  No.

Here’s my defense.  The weather made me do it.  If I was given the opportunity to plead my case to a jury of my peers – any female over the age of 18 afflicted with terminal frizzy hair and water retention issues – I would be assured a speedy acquittal.  The extreme and almost unprecedented early spring humidity was playing havoc with my grooming.  My hair was out of control even though I had upgraded to salon strength de-frizz balm and the excess moisture in the air was causing my body to experience acute bloating boarding on head to toe edema. (Seriously, even my XL my capri track pants were snug and my boobage was swelling out of my Champion athletic bra. What’s with humidity and boob swelling anyways?  Ladies forget the breast enlargement – just move to a humid climate.)  All of this combined to make me not responsible for my actions due to mental defect brought on by acute water vapor coupled with bipolar barometric pressure.

I know, right now you’re thinking, “Oh my God, why isn’t she an attorney.  Clearly Snarky is one of the great legal minds of this millennium.”  Well, here’s the crappy deal – that stupid LSAT and of course, my college GPA kept me out of any kind of law school, even ones in Puerto Rico.  I say they base your law school acceptance on the craftiness of your mind, not your ability to memorize something like Pollock v. The Farmers’ Loan and Trust Co.  I could so do the whole Supreme Court thing and bonus – I look my best in black and white not to mention those full length judges robes would not only hide my cankles, but provide camo for back flab and other unsightly bulges.

My crime spree started on the morning of April 2 when I was doing my most favorite things in the whole wide world; minding my own business, listening to Christian soft jazz as sung by the Kid’s Bop Choir, while doing a little meditative prayer and kegeling.  Because I’m a multitasking dynamo I was doing all this in my backyard and braving the humidity so I could hose off my deck.  I was blissfully unaware that evil was lurking.   It took less than 10 minutes for yard terrorist Barbara Gray (A Very Snarky Christmas) looking Downey fresh and spring like in one of those so simple, but costs a fortune linen shift dresses that say “I take a vacation that’s not based on how many Marriott points I have.” (Damn her) to emerge from her House of Horrors and begin verbally bitch slapping me with complaints that I had “gotten her grass MOIST.”

Any other day I probably would have just let her have a little tantrum and moved on.  We all know that’s what I’m all about – forgiveness and adhering to the Golden Rule.  But today, due to the humidity level from the basement of Hell (BTW – Hell, not a dry heat), I was not in the best of moods and her harangue set me off for many reasons.  First off, I know for a fact that I did not get her grass “moist.”  I share just the tiniest sliver of property line with her.  I informed Barbara that my hose, “Did not have super powers nor was I Elasti-Girl from the Incredibles.  Second, and perhaps most important was her use of the word – “moist?”   Really, you just can’t say wet you have to say moist?  Ick.  Now, being a long-term Suburbanite I know there are cases when you don’t want your yard to get wet, like you’ve just put on some kind of fertilizer or weed and feed application.  As a kind and gracious person I asked Barbara, “Did you have some kind of yard work done where your lawn can’t get wet?”

She looked down her very regal (I’m guessing a tip rhinoplasty or the very least a  cartilage reshaping) nose at me and said, “No, I just don’t want your water on my yard.”

“R-e-a-l-l-y,” I said, using my best you are such a dumb ass voice, “You do know that all of our water comes from the same place?”

“I don’t care.  I just don’t want YOUR water on MY grass. Got it?”

“Oh, I’ve got it alright.”  I said, in trying to sound like a tough chick. Then I aimed my hose in her general direction as she sprinted off.  You could hear her cloven hoofs going clippty clop.  I was hoping she’d wipe out and her designer nose would get a big ole whiff of grass.  Unfortunately she made it safely back to her yard – for now.

I immediately went inside for a restorative burst of air conditioning and tried to compose myself. It took one 12 oz Diet Coke with a twist of lime and just a wee bit of the only booze I had in the house, Skinny Girl Margarita mix.  I assure you it was for medicinal purposes only. I mean who drinks before noon, on a weekday, by herself, at home. Not me. I mean, not me, all the time. After a couple of very unladylike chugs of my special Diet Coke I hit the shower. It was there I had my epiphany probably brought by the sudsy power of Irish Spring body wash and Suave shampoo.

As I lathered, rinsed and repeated I thought about the conundrum that is Barbara Gray.   You would think she would have learned not to irritate me by now. I had brought down some major schemes on her and yet she always comes back for more.  I think she has some freaky control issues that need addressing by a tag team of mental health professionals.  But, until that happens there is nothing I can do – except – continue with a course of corrective behavior training.  Any good parent knows the key to success in disciplining your child or dog is consistency.  I need to be consistent with Barbara.  It’s obvious her “moist” yard comment was a sign of her acting out.  To do nothing would just reward her negative behavior.  I had no choice, but to strike back.  It was my duty as her neighbor to continue to teach her life’s hard lessons.  I was going to throw an impromptu Water Carnival. This party would be 50% Family Fun magazine goodness and 50% Redneck Hillbilly which, if I’m doing the math correctly, equals 100% awesome.

More Tomorrow

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Technically Annoying

Posted on April 6, 2012 by snarkyinthesuburbs

I’m not a Luddite. I don’t eschew technology. I, by no means, dream of being Wilma Flintstone and using a baby wooly mammoth as a vacuum cleaner. I don’t know a lot about wooly mammoths, but I’m betting they shed worse than any german shepherd and I’m sure not even a case of Gain Febreze would dilute their pre-historic stench.  I embrace technology. Why, I wake up every morning and kiss my phone. What I have trouble with is how technology has turned some parents into total idiots.

I’m not talking about the general daily rudeness of people talking incessantly on their phones anywhere and at anytime. That, I’m sad to say, I’ve gotten used to. I’m almost ready to declare, “I surrender” on social media taking over our lives. Once moms took their obsession in utero, I got my white flag ready. What? You’re kidding me – you haven’t been to a baby shower where the mother-to-be hasn’t made a Facebook page for her fetus?  It’s so 2007 for your unborn child not to already have a Twitter handle? At the last baby shower I attended all the guests were asked to whip out their smart phones and “like” the FB page of the 27 week gestation guest of honor.  The unborn child’s status update was, “Knowing I’m going to love all the great gifts I’m going to get at my baby shower today!”  The profile picture was the most recent sonogram.  The baby also had a Twitter account. The mother was tweeting “for the baby,” during the shower.  After she opened a gift, there she would go, right to her phone, and tweet something about each present. Here’s what she tweeted about mine, “I’m not even here yet, but I already love this super soft blanket.  Mommy could you please put it on your tummy right now?”  (P.S. A Tweet does not replace a thank you note.)

Some of you may think this is just sooo adorable and you’d be wrong.  Wrong, because it’s cloying obnoxious.  Your not yet born child does not need to reach out from the womb and start “liking” Pampers on Facebook and following mommy’s ob/gyn on Twitter.  A pregnant woman should have more loftier concerns then trying to increase her “two month’s away from due date” baby’s FB friends.  One pregnant mom told me her goal was for her baby to have “at least 500 friends before she was even born.” I gently tried to tell her goal should be to get some sleep because that was soon going to be in short supply.  Sleep or Facebook?  What a 21st century maternal conundrum.

Just as I was learning to deal with/disguise my social media irritation every man, woman and child had to go out and get an i Pad.  Did you know the i Pad 2 is the number one requested birthday gift from any child hitting the 12 month mark?  Okay, I made that up, but I did, just last week, attend the first birthday party for a precious boy and he got, you guessed it, an i Pad 2.   His mother remarked that, “He just started using my i Pad so I figured he needed one of his own.”  What did he like best about it using it for teething or slobbering?  That mother’s ridiculous remark was one upped by another mom who contributed that her baby was using an i Pad at four months.  Really, mothers, an i Pad competition? Can’t you just stick to the time-honored tradition of bragging that your child started sleeping through the night when they were only 96 hours old?

Whatever, that whole gift thing is none of my business. What is my business is when parents think their i Pad has super powers like invisibility.  Try enjoying your child’s next band or choir concert when the i Padrent sitting in front of you is hoisting their 7.31 x 9.50 tablet in the air – rendering you blind.  Alert Snarky reader Annie recently commented on this experience. “You get this screen glow and can see them zooming in on their child.  Go ahead and try to look around you can’t. It’s a big, bright light right there in your face.” 

 I’m predicting that before the end of the school year, somewhere in America, there will be a i Padrent throw down.  Two tablet wielding parents will be ready to rumble because one parent’s i Pad 2 blocked the other’s parents i Pad from recording for posterity, Facebook and You Tube their kid singing, My Country Tis of Thee.  I can see the other parents crowding around, forming a circle, chanting, “Fight, fight, fight” as they put their tablets in record mode.

I know what I’m talking about. I got into with a i Padrent last week.  There I was minding my own business (really I was) at the movies.  I had taken my daughter to see Disney’s Arrietty.  The coming attractions had just started when a mom comes in with her two boys.  One looked about 7, the other seemed to be 4.  She pulls two gallon size Ziploc bags from her purse that are stuffed with what I’m guessing, due to the sheer quantity, is left over Halloween, Christmas and Valentine Day’s candy.  She gets her boys settled in the row right in front of us and then leaves. Not the theatre, mind you, but she goes and sits 16 rows in front of her kids.  (Yes, I counted.)  I’m thinking WTH?  What mom doesn’t sit with her young children.  The mystery is solved when she pulls out an i Pad, puts on some huge headphones that resemble what you would wear on an airport tarmac to direct planes to their gate and begins to watch something on her screen.

As you can imagine, the shining beacon that is the i Pad screen can be seen fairly well in a dark movie theatre.  Also, her two boys that are sitting 16 rows behind her are not happy campers.  They’re fighting, using their outdoor voices and when not enjoying kicking seats are standing up in them, presumably to better see their mother.  I wait a good 15 minutes to see if A) The boys settle down and get into the movie or B) Pray that someone, who is not me, will go alert the mother to her children’s distress.  None of the above occurred. Oh sure, other people in the theatre complained to their seat mates about the boys and one grandma kept shushing them, but no one got up.  Tag, I was it.

I get up, walk down to the mother and see she’s watching The Bachelor.  “Good Lord, woman,” I think, The Bachelor.  You’re ruining the movie for everyone in the theatre and ditched your boys so you can watch The Bachelor!” Talk about a cry for help.  I lean over to her and say, “Excuse me, but your two boys seem to be missing you a lot.  You might want to sit with them.”

“Huh?  What?” she says in a peeved voice as she takes off her industrial grade headphones. From the looks of it I’ve interrupted her during one of The Bachelor’s riveting rose ceremonies.  Is she expecting me to apologize or something?  I repeat my previous plea and get another dirty look from her.  To appease me, I guess, she stands up and waves at her boys, but makes no move to go sit with them. So again, I gently advise her to sit with her kids and because I ‘m thinking this mom in spatially challenged add, “You know that i Pad screen is incredibly distracting. If you don’t want people to be bothered by it you could go grab your kids and move to the very back row.”

That really ticks her off and I’m guessing she’s also picked up on the fact that I’m not going back to my seat until she goes to her boys. So she grabs her tote bag, her i Pad, motions to her kids and they mercifully leave the theatre.  When this happens the crowd, or at least, the other parents in the audience applaud.  I’m feeling pretty good about my problem solving abilities until after the movie my daughter and I are getting a drink refill (free with purchase of a large beverage) and we hear people leaving another movie complaining about a mom, two rowdy young boys and an i Pad.  The woman didn’t leave she just switched theaters!   If only I had a cloak of invisibility I would have taken her i Pad and submerged it in a vat of movie theatre butter.  Instead, I braced myself for, what I’m sure will be, more upcoming adventures in i Padrenting – The Technically Annoying Years.

**Many thanks for all of you who “liked” me on Facebook!  May the Snark Be With You.  For those that haven’t done the deed yet to stay up-to-date on new posts and take part in my not so deep thoughts click on this Facebook link - http://is.gd/iEgnJ (That’s the abbreviated link to my FB page) or I twitter @snarkynsuburbs.   Thanks also to all the Pinterest folks that are sharing the Snark. Cheers!

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March Fatness

Posted on March 28, 2012 by snarkyinthesuburbs

Why do women hate themselves?  That’s the question my husband asked me last week as I stood in the kitchen chopping Granny Smith apples as he dipped his 73rd blue corn tortilla chip in guacamole and chased it with a Corona. Yeah, I was counting and congratulating myself on the genius decision I made to marry this man some 20 something years ago.  He met all my spouse criteria. He was cankle free and has a freakishly fast metabolism which means he can eat a lot and never worry about wearing a man girdle.  This was a must have.  I could care less about gay marriage – bring it on – but there should be some kind of legal mandate that forbids any couple from joining in matrimony if they both share the metabolism of a whale. (World’s largest creature = world’s slowest metabolism.) My whale-ish inability to burn fat was going to get a kick-start by joining up with Mr. Super Metab. I also required a spouse who was smart.  I hear wives all the time talk about how they’re so much smarter than their husbands.  Really?  Classic mistake.  It’s all about up grading your gene pool, ladies. You want to marry pretty high on the I.Q. scale.  I really wanted to marry smarter because there is a big old dumb ass gene that runs in my family and I needed to do everything in my power to dilute it as much as possible.

What made my husband ask the question – Why do women hate themselves? was that I had just finished a tale of woe about being invited to a “Cleanse” party.  Which I gathered is related to a Diet Shake party, but more hard-core and perhaps is code for “Come Join Us in our Quest for an Eating Disorder.”  A neighbor way, way down the street was hosting the “Cleanse” event and had sent e-vites (from the look of the e-mail list) to any women over the age of 18, who lived in the neighborhood was breathing and ambulatory.  I had clicked the “Oh, so sorry to miss the party” box and blissfully thought that would be the end of thinking about something called a “Cleanse Event.”  I was wrong.

My neighbor, Cleansey was a tiny woman with straw blonde hair and so little body fat she was boob-less and butt-less.  If you looked at her in direct sunlight she resembled an upside down broom. Cleansey wouldn’t take no for an answer. She came over to my house and re-invited me, stopped me when she saw me walking my dogs and sent me a barrage of e-mails about “how she just knew, KNEW, this could change my life.”  What makes her think I want to even change my life? Doesn’t it take a lot of hubris – as soon as say this my son yells downstairs, “Exaggerated pride or self-confidence“ and my husband looks at me and asks, “SAT vocab word?”

“Yes, and if I knew taking a prep class would give him SAT Tourette’s, I probably wouldn’t have signed him up. Where was I, oh yeah, isn’t it exceedingly presumptuous to assume that someone is unhappy with the way they are? I don’t wear a T-shirt that says “Looking to Change – Please Help Me.”  Maybe I have the most wonderful, joyous life in the world and would die, really die a quick death if anything were to happen to alter my perfect existence or maybe I’m change-a-phobic or better yet maybe she’s a changeholic and needs to be under 24 hour supervised medical care.”

I was supremely annoyed and when I got to the part of my story where the neighbor was causing my Snarky senses to tingle. My husband stopped in mid chip and said, “You might want to get that checked out.  Maybe there’s a cream for it, like a Snarky Icy Hot treatment.”

I thew a dish towel at him and asked, “Why do you think my presence is so desperately needed?  Was I going to be the mascot for the party?  The token big girl? I’m telling you this neighbor really needs to back off.”

That’s when my multi-taking eating, drinking and lovingly caressing his i Pad screen husband (God, I don’t think I was ever that object of that kind of adoration.) looked up and asked the question, “Why do women hate themselves?“

“What do you mean?  I don’t hate myself.  I’m no i Pad 3 and therefore no longer the love of your life, but I’m okay with that.  You’ll come back to me -  you always do.   First you cheated on me with your Blackberry, then you threw that over for your i phone and now it’s the i Pad, but sooner than later you’ll tire of your slutty tech mistress.  She’ll let you down. She’ll throw a temper tantrum and refuse to unlock even though you know you’re typing in the right passcode or she’ll go all passive aggressive on you and not hold a charge long enough and then there’s a very good chance her apps will  have a bipolar episode.  That’s when you’ll come crawling back to me looking for some low tech affection.”

He gave me a guilty look, stopped touching his i Pad and said, “I’m talking about women in general.  Admit it – women, in general, hate themselves.  There is no way in hell a guy would have any kind of party whose soul purpose would be to make you feel bad about yourself.  Guys have parties where you drink, talk about sports, lie about money and how great you are.”

I tried to interrupt him to make a point and defend Team Female, but he was on a roll.

“Furthermore if some guy tried to have a party whose main purpose was to make you feel like crap and then attempt to sell you something.  He’d get a beat down.”

“Okay, okay, you maybe on to something. I’ll admit that some women, may at times, not like themselves very much, but we, as a general rule, do not hate ourselves.”

“Wrong.  If women liked themselves then something called a Cleanse Event would never be considered a party.”

Later that night as I unloaded the dishwasher I had to admit that my husband had a point.  How else could a person send out an e-vite with the words “bowel refresh” and get women to click on the box that says, “Thanks! I’d love to come.”

The next morning I brought up this topic with some friends as we walked our dogs.  I told them what my husband said and was waiting for the moral outrage.  You know what I got? Agreement.  Instead of women shouting, “What a bunch of crap!”  I got, “Yeah, we do kind of hate ourselves.”

“Really,” I asked, We do? Why?”

My friend Kelly said, “I don’t know blame our mothers, blame men, but not many of us are in love with who we are.”

I said, “I think we should blame ourselves.  We suck and you what’s even worse this whole becoming a mom just turns back the hands of time.”

I see my dog walking companions give each other the “look.”

“Yeah, just stop with that.  I see it. I know what that means.  That’s the, “Oh dear God, she’s going off on a rant” look.  Well, this is good one – so settle in.”

“We’ll settle in, if you’ll settle down,” says Allison.  “We love your rants. We promise. They make us all walk faster, but don’t worry it’s not because we’re trying to get away from you.”

I gave her a look at my own and began my rant prep. It starts with a deep breath to ensure an optimum supply of oxygen.  Really, you don’t want to have to slow down your rant to breathe.  It messes up the whole rhythm or much worse gives someone a chance to pull a rantus interruptus which is the height of bad manners.  Once I had ensured my lungs were in scuba tank mode I began.

“Becoming a mom means time traveling.  No, I take that back. Becoming a mom and entering an elementary school means time traveling.  When I worked full-time I was judged on my ability which meant how much money I could make for the company.  If I was making money I could look like the love child of a troglodyte and a troll and no one would care.  I mean I’d have to smell good and address any unsightly facial hair issues, but really my appearance wouldn’t be a deal breaker.  But, enter a freaking elementary school holding the hand of the love of your life – your child – and it’s junior high part 2.  It’s all about the pretty, the skinny, your clothes, your handbag, your daughter’s backpack and that backpack better not be off the rack at Target.  You little girl needs to work it in a Vera Bradley or Coach Poppy.  There’s also the posturing, the cliques, the feeling that the group of moms you just walked by were talking about you. And God forbid if you dare to admit to eating and sleeping.  Yes, the two very things essential for our species survival is frowned upon. Eating is bad – unless you’re subsisting only on, I don’t know Whole Food’s Fair Trade organic eucalyptus leaves. What are we kola bears?  And sleeping means you’re a lazy slob.  Do you realize how many moms brag about how little sleep they get?  We’re not mothers of infants anymore we’re allowed to sleep – right.? Even worse to prove their not sleeping moms use social media.  Facebook and Twitter are their “Look at me I’m not sleeping” logs.  You know I’m right about this. How many times have you gone on Facebook in the morning and seen moms posting at 3:35 a.m. “Still working on my volunteer project or I can’t sleep going to the gym.” It’s hell and we do it to ourselves.  As much as we’d like to we can’t blame men or our mothers.  It’s 21st century Momming.  I tell you years from now cultural anthropologists are going to look back on this and it will be like the stonings in biblical times.  We’re killing each other and that’s why someone can throw a Cleanse Party and we’ll all come.  We’re not Generation X we’re Generation Idiot.”

And then I had to shut up because I felt like my lungs were going to explode.

Allison spoke first, “I have nothing to say, but that you’re right, I’m hungry and I slept 8 hours last night.”

Then Kelly said, “Oh God, you’re planning a scheme aren’t you?”

“I can honestly say, I currently have nothing planned (pause) at this juncture,  but as we all know that could change.”

The next day things did change.  I was running errands at the mall and just happened to walk by a Mrs. Field’s Cookie store.  There in the display case was a large round cookie cake decorated to look like a basketball and in big letters March Madness was spelled out in black frosting. As soon as I saw that cookie I got an idea.  I asked the young woman behind the counter if she could replace the M in madness with a F and the D with a T?  She said, “No problem.  Just give me a minute.”

She takes the cookie cake to the back and then comes out a couple of minutes later and says in a perplexed voice, “You do realize your cookie cake now reads March Fatness?”

Smiling I say, “Yes, I do.”  I then pay for the cookie and literally skip out of the mall.  I was going to go to the “Cleanse Event” this evening after all and my cookie cake was going with me.  When I got to my car I called Allison and told her I needed her to go the Cleanse.  She said, “Hell no.”  Then I mentioned the cookie.

“Is it from Mrs. Field’s or the Cookie Company?  Because if it’s Mrs. Field’s I’ll go, that buttercream icing is the best and you better make sure I get a big piece with lots of icing.”

“Yes, it’s Mrs. Field’s and yes I promise you’ll get the biggest piece with most icing.”

“Then I guess I’m going to a cleanse.”

I announced to my family during dinner that I would be gone for about an hour to attend a party.  My husband gave me a worried look and said, “The Cleanse Party – you’re actually going?  I’m afraid to ask why?”

My daughter then over-shares that I bought a cookie cake for the party.  Big mouth.

“You’re taking a cake to something called a cleanse party?  Yeah, like this is going to end well.  Tell me again which neighbor it is so I can be sure to avoid them for the next six months.”

I just sigh and roll my eyes and then my son whips out his phone and shows his dad how he’s taken some map app and put little flags in all the locations of people I’ve pissed off.  He tells my husband he’s named them “Zones of Exclusion.” It’s times like this I think I deserve a better family.

The “party” started at 7 p.m.  I had decided to arrive 30 minutes late.  I take my cookie cake and begin to walk cross the golf course for two reasons.  It’s faster and it gives me a terrific vantage point to spy on the party before I enter.   The “Cleanse Event’ neighbor’s house backs up to the 12th hole and has a nice cluster of maple trees I can stand behind and do a little Peeping Tom action.  As I’m walking across the course some random golf nazi runs out of her backyard to scold me for walking on the golf course.  I don’t get it.  No one’s playing.  It’s getting dark and it’s grass.  I’m walking on freaking grass not the Shroud of Turin.  I pretend I don’t hear her and start jogging.  Which isn’t that easy with a cookie cake the size of a large pizza.  I get to the maple trees and just as I thought I have a bird’s eye view into the back of Cleansy’s house.  The family room looks pretty full of people and I noticed trays of carrots and celery and a juicer.  That’s was my cue that it was time to liberate the cleanse. Just then my phone rings and it’s Allison.

“Why aren’t you here?”

“I am here. I hiding behind some trees on the golf course and looking right into the french doors of Cleansy’s house.”

“Wave at me.”

“Why would I wave?  You can’t see me.  It’s almost dark.”

“Just wave.”

“I’m waving.  Do you see me?”

“Maybe. Where’s the cookie cake?”

“I had to put it on the ground because I can’t hold the box and my phone.”

“Get my cake off the ground. Gross, think about the ants. Hold on a minute I’m going to walk to the bathroom so I can talk.  So guess what?  Cleansy has all of us here eating some cauliflower crap, drinking some kind of witches brew she’s calling green tea and she’s trying to sell us $350 juicers so we can do the cleanse.”

No way – $350 for a juicer!  I seriously would have more respect for her if she was a whore.”

“Really, you would respect her more if she was a prostitute?”

“Well, at least she’d be selling something, somebody wanted and not trying to lower her neighbors self-esteem so she shake them down for cash.  You  know what really makes me mad.  She’s trying to get us to buy a $350 juicer and not once, not one time, has she so much as bought a roll of gift wrap or a box of Girl Scout cookies from my kids. Yeah, I’d like her better as a whore.”

“Okay, whore it is.  Now, just get over here.  I want my cookie cake.”

I leave the golf course and walk to the Cleansy’s front door.  I don’t even bother to ring the door bell. I just saunter in and place the cookie cake on the dining room table right next to a tray of broccoli crowns.  Let me tell you that cake attracted quite a crowd and the party hostess was not pleased. She trots into her dining room, sees the cake and says in most non hostess voice, “WHO brought THIS?”

Oh, hi, I did,” I say.  See how cute it is?  It’s says March Fatness.  Isn’t that kind of darling?”

(“Darling” being my “go to” word to disguise when I’m being an ass.)

“It most certainly is not “darling.”  Nothing in that cake, cookie, whatever it is – is on the cleanse list.”

“Oh, sorry.  I didn’t know we were staring the cleanse right at this moment. You know what? I bet all the grease in the buttercream icing will act as awesome colon lube for upcoming cleanse. ”

“You can’t be serious about that,” she says in a pissy voice, “And I’ll have you know this evening is the kick off party to starting your cleanse.” Now her voice gets a little breathy and high-pitched like she’s just seen Jesus and she coos, “You can buy this juicer tonight and tomorrow wake up and start your brand new life.”

“What if I like my life the way it is?  I happen to think I have a great life.

As soon as I finished my sentence someone I had never seen before walks into the dining room and goes, “Yum.  When can I have some of that?”

“Right now,” says Allison and using her hands, rips off two piece of cookie cake, gives one to the woman next to her and shoves the other piece in her mouth.

Cleansy looks me up and down and says, “Don’t tell me there isn’t room in your life for improvement?”

Allison, while chewing her cake and with orange icing on her nose lies and goes, “No, she has the perfect life.  In fact, having her life was my number 1 New Year’s resolution – 3 years in row now.  Number 2, in case anyone cares, was having more sex.”

I look at Allison, shake my head, laugh and then noticed Cleansy is getting really mad.

“I’m going to have to ask you to remove that “cake” (she says the word cake like it’s the F word or something) from my home.

“Oh, okay, I just brought it as hostess gift, but no problem I’ll take my cake and go.”

I begin to close the lid on the cookie cake and a couple of women ask me what I’m doing.

“Cleansy wants me and my cake out of her.  I think I offended her with my food offering.”

A youngish woman who I know from the soccer fields says, “Where are going with it?”

“I don’t know I was thinking of taking it out to the 12th tee box and finishing it off.”

Another mom goes, “Can we come with you?  I don’t have $350 to blow on a juicer and I want to leave before she starts the aggressive sales pitch.”

“Sure, in fact, let me make an announcement.  Excuse me, excuse me, everyone.  I’m going to be taking my cookie cake out to the number 12 tee, it’s right over there, and eating it until there’s not one crumb left.  If you care to join me I’d love to have you.”

Cleansy squeals as me, Allison and four other moms walk out of her house.  We get to the golf course, plop down on the 12th hole, put the cookie cake box in the middle of our impromptu circle and begin eating and bitching about $350 juicers. Allison asks, “Did everything go as you had planned?”

“Oh, I think better than planned. Once this gets out there’s not a diet shake, diet cookie, starvation, cleanse, de-tox, juice fast, weight loss party that anyone in a 50 mile radius will invite me to and that means my work here is done.”

And then I took a really big bite of cookie.

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Hot Mom Problems

Posted on March 19, 2012 by snarkyinthesuburbs

On occasion I like to open up my Snarky site to a guest blogger so they can share their thoughts.  I was approached last week by a woman who thought I was incredibly unkind to the much maligned minority group known as Hot  Moms.  I thought she had a valid point so today our guest blogger, who’s going by the name “Hotter Than You,” reveals the hotter the mom the bigger the hot mess.

Even Hot Moms have problems.  You think it’s easy being tan 24/7 365?  Let me tell you it’s so not.  A March spring break only complicates our lives. It means we have to go from being just yoga pant hot to swimsuit super hot practically overnight.  The hair removal issues alone require advanced strategic scheduling.  It’s not like you can just go in and have a head to toe wax job.  Any Hot Mom worth her silver glitter Uggs knows you have to wax in stages spread out over at least a week for maximum hair removal efficiency.  For those of you who don’t believe that anyone as gorgeous as me can possibly have any difficulties in her life – here’s my List of Hot Mom Problems (Spring Break Edition).

Vajazzle glue causes epic lady business rash.  OMG and WTF are salons all buying their vajazzle glue from China?!!  This is my 3rd crotch rash since last November.  Just stop right there, I know what you’re going to say, “Maybe it’s not the glue, maybe your allergic to vajazzling.”  About that – hell to the no.  It’s not me, it’s salons pretending to be high-end and probably using an Elmer’s Glue Stick or worse Gorilla Glue to get those crystals to stay put. This is what’s wrong with America – not $4 a gallon gas, unemployment or the freaking environment, but sub-standard salon service.  When, I ask you, is a presidential candidate going to man up and talk about that?  You’d think Romney with that big old Ken doll mane of hair would have addressed this quality of life issue.  Just imagine the arsenal of styling products he must use to keep that fullness, color and hair height looking so good everyday?  (Off topic kind of – Can you imagine being the wife of a presidential candidate?  There is not enough Zoloft  in the world to make me stand by my husband’s side every damn day and act fascinated with whatever he says.  God, it would be like dating all over again minus the alcohol.  Eww!)

Should I pre-oil or wait till I arrive at the pool?  This is a tough one.  You want to look your best when you make your pool-side debut which suggest that pre-oiling is the way to go.  This way your spray tan is super shiny and just shouts, “Hey look at me. I’m hot!”  But, if you pre-oil that robs you of the opportunity to immediately attract attention by dropping your swim bag, ignoring your children, grabbing your lotion, putting one leg up on a chaise lounge (or using a pool umbrella as an impromptu stripper pole) and begin massaging shiny goo all over yourself.  Is there anything sexier than me in a bikini, one leg propped up high on the back of a chair, my fake wonder breasts trying to escape out of my tiny triangle top, doing an application of sun tan oil super high on my inner thigh while my vajazz peeks out?  The short answer – Hell No! P.S.  Just to prove that Hot Moms are giving, kind people I’ll share with you this secret.  Pour some glitter into your suntan oil so you not only shimmer, but sparkle.  You’re welcome.

Navel piercing belly bling doesn’t match vajzzle crystals - Seriously people who run salons, how hard is it to keep a decent supply of coordinated crystal colors in stock. Like I want to put on a bikini and walk around the resort wearing mismatched crystals.  I want my body bling to tell a color story of supreme hotness not be a hideous Fashion No.

Should I be worried that the esthetician who does my waxing gets more “hands on” time “down there” than my husband? Could I be a more loving and concerned fourth wife to even think about this?  No, I could not.  This proves that I’m hot and I care. Which is the most awesome combination e-v-e-r!  I wouldn’t have even have thought about this except a group of us mega hotties were talking while waiting for our pilates reformer class (mat pilates sooo 24 Hour Fitness) to begin and the subject of sex came up and one beauty mentioned that she did the math and her hoo haa spent more time getting groomed than it did getting boom boomed. (If you now what I mean.)  Is that so wrong?  Is it our fault that hair really does grow overnight or that our husbands are obsessed with their i Pads?

Hair up or down?  Hot Moms want to wear their hair down at all times. It’s part of our by-laws and a big part of our sacred Hot Mom pledge.  Pretty much no matter what the circumstances or sports activity we like to have our hair flowing.  You really can’t even qualify to be a Hot Mom if you gave birth with bad hair.  Seriously, if you were a sweaty mess with your hair in some kind of scrunchie, pony tail hell while in labor then shame on you. I delivered heavily medicated (Don’t tell me you didn’t demand they top off your epidural?) in full make-up. (Waterproof foundation and mascara are key.)  My hair was freshly blown out and I had on some darling hoop earrings and a tasteful diamond necklace (An early push present.) I even had my husband apply some Channel Lip Plumper (I picked a muted pink color so it wouldn’t clash with the god awful blue/green hospital gown) right before the last push so I would look amazing for the delivery photos. If you think having a C-section is permission to look frumpy, think again.  Surgery is no excuse to slack off.  You take your just styled hair, gently fold it into the surgical cap thingy and ta da – after the C surg and combination tummy tuck (Really why waste perfectly good anesthesia?) you take that cap off, swing your hair a couple of times and you’re back in the game.

Wow, I totally got sidetracked.  What I’ve been trying to get to is the whole pool side Hot Mom hair issue.  Yes, you want to wear it down, but the whole messy bun thing is soo in fashion and if your hair is in a messy bun then you don’t have to worry about it trailing over your boobs and hiding your spectacular cleavage that you paid soo much for.  It’s like Sophia’s choice – do you put your hair up for best boob view or keep it down and stay true to your Hot Mom pledge. I haven’t been this conflicted since I had to decide whether or not I wanted a nipple enhancement when I got my last augmentation. It’s things like this that keep me awake at night.  Thank you pharmacy gods for Ambien.

Bad Spray Tan - Yes, bad spray tans happen to hot people.  Trust me if you’re a Hot Mom you’ve, somewhere in your career of being beautiful, have received a tan that can best be described as ashy orange or as us Hot Moms call it assy orange. It’s a tanning hazard that comes with the territory of being amazing.  The first time this happens you’ll go through the Five Stages of Tanning Tears.  Stage one is denial that your tan even looks that orange.  You’ll tell yourself it’s just the fluorescent light in the store or that it will look better in sunlight.  Next, you’ll get angry at your tanning establishment and strike out at them on their Facebook page calling them the “Orange Julius” of tanning salons.  After you get that out of your system you’ll experience Stage 3 and probably drop to your knees and offer a moving pray to the Patron Saint of Hot Moms – Pamela Anderson -  vowing to never ever ask for “extra custom airbrushing” again if she would use her powers to magically change your tan from pumpkin to sun-kissed.  When that doesn’t work you’ll get very depressed and try to perhaps drink yourself into such a stupor that you no longer know your primary colors – making it no big deal that you’re currently the color of a carrot. Lastly, you’ll accept your orangeness, buy a six-pack of St. Ives exfoliating body scrub at Wal Mart mix that with some Comet with bleach and spend a half day in the shower rubbing your skin raw or as I like to call it a “at home full body chemical peel” to knock down your orange to a more acceptable burnt sienna

The Nip Slip – Is it really that bad?  If I’m in a bikini chances are I’m going to nip slip. Sometimes it just happens and sometimes I’ll admit I make it happen. It’s not because I enjoy showing off my stuff, well it is kinda, but it’s more because I believe my boobs have the power to make people happy.  Take last week for example, there I was in my Hot Mom spring break uniform – super skimpy bikini, belly piercing, hair down with a straw cowboy hat, Ugg flip-flops and a trio of David Yurman “statement” necklaces.  Right next to me was this scary mom in a freaking tank suit or whatever they call swim wear that covers you up from chest to thigh.  This lady didn’t even have a sarong or a maxi dress on instead she was wearing navy blue capri track pants OVER her swimsuit that appeared to have food stains on them .(Psst – It was Snarky.)  I was about to hurl and then I noticed she was physically deformed – cankles and a severe case of whale knees . I hope she’s a member of that support group I donated to. What’s it called? Is it Doctors Without Borders? No, no, that’s not it.  Oh, now I remember it’s – People Without Plastic Surgeons. If that wasn’t bad enough she keep on talking to her husband about something called a “brisket taco.”  God, she couldn’t shut up about it. It was all “the brisket was so lean.  The sauce was so savory.”  Who even eats solid foods after Christmas? I gave up chewing for Lent.  To get this rocking bod I’ve been on a protein shake diet for going on almost 4 months.  I felt so sorry for her poor husband that I did an “on purpose” double nip slip.  I’m sure it just about made his year. Why have incredible breasts if you can’t use them to bring joy to others?  – I guess I can check “good deed done for the day” off my “to do” list.

See, I’ve got my share of problems.  All I ask is that the next time you’re so quick to judge me to remember that although I’m immensely better looking than you and my credit card, of course, has a much higher limit, I could be suffering from a crotch rash from hell and that’s all the reason I need to cut in front of you in the school drop off-line – again.

_____________________________

Breaking News Alert! It has just come to my attention that a few of you do not know what a Vajazzle is. For the love of all the glitters please check out my Vajazz Trilogy: Vajazzle Seriously?, Your Valentine Vajazzle Headquarters and PTA Vajazzle Fundraiser Time Line.

**Many thanks for all of you who “liked” me on Facebook!  May the Snark Be With You.  For those that haven’t done the deed yet to stay up-to-date on new posts and take part in my not so deep thoughts click on this Facebook link - http://is.gd/iEgnJ (That’s the abbreviated link to my FB page) or I twitter @snarkynsuburbs.   Thanks also to all the Pinterest folks that are sharing the Snark. Cheers!

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