BYOCup

The boys are 10. 10! In 4 months they turn 11. I miss them being little and their voices being adorable and still having the baby skin. But preteen is fun and amusing. 

It's their baseball year. All those years getting them into baseball and being able to be there for games, I wasted. Now that I work days and only get one saturday off each 6 weeks, we're actually going to sign them up for baseball. Genius, right?

Delaying the team sports means we really needed to get them caught up on the game. A last minute winter baseball camp was required and believe it or not, I got them signed up!

They needed batting helmets and new gloves for camp. The trip to Dicks sporting proved Dick is actually a prick who requires lots of monies for you to have good sporting gear. But that's ok because my routies (people who actually like me on my route) were very loving with their wallets for Christmas tips and overtime pays bank and Josh's new job actually pays him almost what he's worth with his mad installing skills.
While the boys were lovingly testing out glove grips and making sure their helmets were snuggly around their ears and winding bats to point in the direction of their next home run like Babe Ruth, I found myself in the cup aisle. Oh, the cup. The item that makes girls giggle and boys thank God that someone else is just as worried about their penis as they are. And lets not forget about moms who want grandkids one day and dads who know what a baseball or a toddler's headbutt to the junk feels like. The cup aisle, safety at it's finest.
 I wondered why cups have to look so fancy. No one is going to see it. Yes, women have bras of every size and color. We have Hello Kitty playfully holding our boobies at optimum cleavage level. The straps have designs that make a shirt shoulder slip still good fashion. And it's actually a job requirement in a bra shop to be able to measure our mean tatas. But bra fashion statements also serve a HUGE purpose... we're women and cute sells to us.
But a neon green cup or a bright orange with a masterlock tech weave in a cup? In what sports movie did you ever get to the love scene and the woman is lusting after a guy in nothing but a high fashion cup? Uuuuuhhh no, the cup is not on in movies. Why? Because it's a cup. A penis shield. The blocker. And I really hope Bruce, the first baseman, is not in the locker room squealing and pointing saying "Omg, Dude! That cup is so badass!" with the wearer going "It was a BOGO dude, I got a steal plate finish one with racing stripes for free. I'll show you that one tomorrow."

So, realistically, you guys are just as weak as women when it comes to frivolous fashion. Case and point! Now don't roll your eyes at us when we ask why you don't want the Homer Simpson boxers. We have Rainbow Dash panties. Don't be ashamed to want your batman-a-roos with the fake cape in the back. It's O'tay. 

The thought on bras brought me to my next conundrum. Women wear bras daily. Girls get training bras to get them used to having a line of skin in the middle of their back itch hourly. We wear bras so our boobs don't hang and hurt or bounce us to death when we run. So why are guys not wearing cups daily when the male genitalia is in just as much danger?? I understand bats and balls and a stolen base slide into someone else's cleat hurts, but you can't convince me that playing sports is any more dangerous than a boy having a brother. The daily "Ouch!" followed with a boy walking to his room holding his crotch while the other laughs his head off with a guilty look and a misused spatula in his hand is proof boys need to wear cups daily. We should start them in training cups as soon as they laugh at their first penis joke. We'll call them nut buddies and they can even have their own super hero force show after them. 
You can do this, my men friends! You can take your young son by the hand, lead him through the cup aisle, calm his nervousness, buy his first cup, and then wait till he gets home from school after his first day of wearing it so he can tell you all about how jealous his friends are that he got his first cup. It's how us moms roll with our daughters and training bras. I don't have daughters but I know that was a proud moment with my mom. You dad's deserve that moment too. 
You say the cup is useless most of the day? I have the chest of a 10 year old girl and I still have to wear a bra. FEEL MY PAIN! WEAR A DAILY CUP!

I leave you with a nut montage of boys being boys to further prove my point.  :) 

Welcome back Kotter

I can't say welcome back without the song going through my head...

It's been a while! Years even. Much has changed. My kids are now 10. I survived the 30 year mark of my life. We now live in Oregon. I no longer work nights. In fact, I no longer work a heavy labor job. I'm a mail carrier. Whoop whoop for a postal job promotion!
What hasn't changed? My husband :) Well he has, but in good way, not that he needed it. But he's still here and still wonderful so hopefully that never changes. 
I was going to make a new blog about just my postal experiences (being a mail carrier is wonderful for the storybooks) but then I remembered I have too many blogs... that I don't write in...
So this one will be revamped (I don't know if I use that word appropriately but when I use it I sound smarter and more organized).
I'm thinking about changing it to Kauregon instead of Kauritis because we just found out I have rheumatoid arthritis and itis now reminds me of pain instead of something contagious. Did you know itis is actually the medical term for inflammation? I always thought itis was a bug you caught or something like that. Like "They caught the itis."
And I love love love Oregon.
So Kauregon would be awesome.
No wories if you like the name Kauritis though because I'm a procrastinator and changing things is not something we do well. Procrastination is the key!
Anyways, when I talk with my dad (who lives way too far away) and tell him stories mostly about what happens on my mail route, he says I should write it down and make a book someday. While writing is my dream, I'm not ready for a book criticism. So I'll just keep it all here for now :)


And because this show was funny

The were climbing the walls!

I'm slightly bitter at this moment. I dropped my kids off at "The Lab" which is their elementary youth group. They have these bars on the walls and I've wondered what they are. I found out what they are and now my grrr face is here. They're climbing bars. The kids jump up, grab the bar, run up the wall, and flip off. WHERE WERE THOSE IN MY SUNDAY SCHOOL?!?!?! I want to file a complaint. I had Bible bingo and they get 20 min of play time, 45 min of Church, and then 10 min play time again before the parents come to get them. That way your kids are worn out and ready to relax and babble about what they learned that day. My kids are excited to go and they love to tell me what they learned that night. Where's my mind? It's back at those bars... staring... stewing... bittering... plotting... grrrrrrr. Ok so not plotting and I'm not really that upset, but still, their toys are so much more awesome!!!! *cries and plays with my My Little Pony that did NOTHING*

Japanese girl battles with her baby red pandas

Dear cutest animals in the world,
Why is your cute fluffiness on the other side of the world from me? I just want to cuddle with you until PETA comes and tells me to put the fluffiness down. I don't mind if you punch me in the face while I'm sleeping. I'll even let you eat my food... not my cake, my food. If anyone tries to hurt you I'll kill them with my evil ninja mommy glare. So what do you say? It's a deal? Yay for fluffiness!
Love always,
Not so fluffy but still loveable me

Tim Hawkins-Scary Bedtime Prayer/ I'm a bad parent

This video cracks me up. My parents prayed this with me as a kid and it was more reciting than actually knowing the words. But as I got older I knew what it meant and it seemed like a good prayers so I've been praying it with my kids. They even had a bear that when you squeezed it, it said this prayer and then added "But the angels watch me through the night, until I wake in mornings light." Seems like the bear knew how creepy the original was before I did.
Future prayer:
Dear God-dude,
Thanks for today and yesterday. Please let there be a tomorrow. I'll give you a cookie. If I have to die tonight please take me to Heaven... I'll give you a cookie. But I'd really like it if I could live. K thanx gnight.
Love always,
Me
P.S. I have plans this week. Please don't kill me.
P.P.S. I have cookies.

I would miss my dad

I've been laying in bed not able to sleep... again. NO MORE CEREAL BEFORE BED!
Anyways my never ending thought process keeps going back to the same thing, I don't want to lose my dad.
No I'm not trying to be weird or morbid. At work I have a machine partner named James who lost his dad a little over a year ago. He didn't have a huge relationship with his dad for years prior to death but he still chokes up every time he mentions it. We were talking about parents and how we're getting to an age where we really notice our parents are aging also. I might still be really young in my head but life is telling me 27 is only 3 years away from 30 and that's when you're old. (No offense to you old geezers out there.)  And if I'm old my parents are older and your body doesn't do so well the older it gets.
That thought made me want to cry.
A little bit about mine and my dad's past: My dad was only 18 when his dad died of a heart attack. I never met my grandpa and my dad really didn't talk about him that much but considering his job I'd say he was probably in shape.
I can't remember how old I was but I remember watching tv with my dad and he kept going out to the balcony in his and my mom's room. He was really worried and it was like this heaviness in the room that something was happening. He looked at me and said "My chest really hurts." I know I was pretty young because my response was "Think of something that doesn't hurt and you'll feel better." After my dad saw a cardiologist for the first time and we confirmed that my dad had been having small heart attacks it hit me that I was there. I should have called 911 or something. I know I was little but it was one of those moments where you knew something was really happening because I could remember so many details of that night and you know it's something you should be scared of if you just have that feeling.
When my dad had his angioplasty I didn't really understand what was going on. I figured that I loved my dad so I wouldn't lose him. It never entered my mind that people I love could die. It just doesn't happen. It's like you're the main character of a show and only the little insignificant people die off.
I was a little older when my dad had his bipass surgery. I'm not sure how it happened but his heart was struggling so hard to survive that it actually grew a connection from the front of one of the chambers to the back of the heart. I watched them do a video of his heart on a screen and a doctor explained to me the four chambers of your heart. My dad acted like it was the most exciting stuff in the world and I just wanted the hospital stuff to be done with. I was so arrogant and ignorant and every other stupid name in the book. I just wanted to go home and it didn't hit me till way too late in the game that my dad could have died.
When my dad came out of surgery we were able to see him. Durring a bipass they stop your heart so his skin was pale on the sides but he was covered in iodine on top. My dad held up his hand with the "I love you" sign and my mom started crying and said something about my dad being ok, dont worry Tom you're ok, you're not going anywhere. That's when it hit me first. This is real, this is happening, this is not ok, I'm not the main character of a book, he could have been gone, panic panic PANIC. But I didn't. I just stood there. My only thought was he can go home soon, we can go home, this can be done. And within minutes of thinking about home my panic was gone and I was in my ignorant reality where my dad would live forever.
My dad had a problem due to the surgery that kept him in the hospital for a while. I was so sick of walking through the double doors to get to his room, I hated walking back out of them. It was like jail. I wanted to see my dad. I would think about it all day until we pulled up to the hospital. But I wanted to see hime at home. Not there. You're ok at home, you're sick at the hospital. I hated the nurses so much. I hated the male nurse who had the cutsie designs on his uniform who got excited every time my dad got a new chicken noodle soup cup with a balloon attached saying get well soon. How about get well now? How about a card for me that tells me to wake up, get over myself, and realize life is happening. And how about when we get home instead of serving dinner out of those stupid cups we just smash them?
My mom was not my mom that whole time. It's like part of her had died. It wasn't until I met Josh that I really understood that feeling of if something ever happened to the person I love I would die. There's that connection. And I was such a butt to her even though she was so worried about my dad. The more I think about it the more I just want go back in the past and scream at myself to stop being so selfish and self involved.
But that feeling of knowing that life isn't forever really sunk in when I had kids. Now I'm seeing it from my dad's side. He didn't want to be there. He knew I wanted him home. He knew I didn't understand how final death was. And now I do know. But now I know so much that I almost want to be ignorant again. When I watch my husband or kids sleeping I watch for the rising and falling of the covers to make sure they're still sleeping. If it doesn't rise and fall enough for me to be sure I make a noise to halfway wake them up. Sometimes I just wake Josh up. Some days I'll let Josh or the boys sleep in and I'll think they should be up by now and then I start to worry and then I tell myself not to worry but then I get angry at myself and say if I don't check now and they're dead I'll hate myself forever for not being there.
I don't want life to be final. I don't want people to die and never come back. Every time someone dies someone loses someone they love, even if the person who died is a giant jerkface. I fully believe in Heaven but when I get to Heaven I won't know who my family or friends were. They'll just be faces in Heaven. I want to know them like I know them now and make memories, not remember memories. Death is too final for me.
I wish I would have thought all those times that I could have lost my dad. I wish I could take back every mean word and every action I've ever done to lose his trust. I wish I would have hugged him more as a kid. I wish I would have told him thank you every time he took me to Prescott with him on business. I know I still have time with him but I'm not a kid anymore. I'm married now. He's not the main man in my life. I really took him for granted.
Right now I'm on the phone with him. Halfway through all this I decided to call him and let him know I'm not ignoring him, I'm just homesick. I need to remember that there's going to be a day that I remember all this and I'm going to want to call him and just hear his voice but he won't be there.
I know this is all rambling this morning but I can't get this out of my head.
No more convos with James about parents dieing. I'll deal with it when it happens. Hopefully it wont be for years and years and hundreds of years.
But to anyone out there who's reading this who has lost a parent, I dont know what you're going through because thankfully it hasn't happened to me. But I know what being terrified of it feels like. I'm here for anyone that just wants to talk about how awesome their parents were...
And I'm here to kick some sense into your kids if they're taking you for granted.
I love my mom and dad.
I love my Josh.
I love my kids.
Thank you God so much for the second chances you've blessed me with. I get it now.

Kitchen Intruder Song

A while back there was a joke between my WoW vent friends and me that started because I love food. People would say they were eating something and I would say I was on my way over. Somehow it turned into me creepin into people's windows and stealing their food. So... because my mind doesn't stop... I revamped a song.. just for jooo!
From my mind to your screen, the premier of the kitchen intruder song!

She’s in your frigerator
She’s snatchin' your cupcakes up
tryna eat em so y’all need to
hide yo forks, hide yo knives
hide yo forks, hide yo knives
hide yo forks, hide yo knives
and hide yo spoons yah
cuz she eatin' errything out here

you told her what you havin' fo lunch
She's lookin for you
she gon find you
she gon find you
so you can run and hide that,
run and hide that run and hide that,
grandma grand, grand, grandma

she got yo adress
you done left IP adress and all
you are so dumb
 she gonna eat yo plumb... for real
the lady got away leaving behind dirty plates
my steak was stolen by a fat chick in the projects
so dumb, eat yo plumb, so dumb, so dumb

She’s in your frigerator
She’s snatchin' your cupcakes up
tryna eat em so y’all need to
hide yo forks, hide yo knives
hide yo forks, hide yo knives
hide yo forks, hide yo knives
and hide yo spoons yah
cuz she eatin' errything out here

you told her what you havin' fo lunch
She's lookin for you
she gon find you
she gon find you
so you can run and hide that,
run and hide that run and hide that,
grandma grand, grand grandma






*bows and rolls off stage*