Someone Invited The Curmudgeon To A Party And Now I'm On PinINterest

One night at Mabel's house:

Mabel: Hey! You know what would be cool?

Belinda: What?

Mabel: We should have a Pinterest Party!

Me: (Silently. In my own head, while remembering Katie's fifth birthday party planning.) Crapazoidal.....

Belinda: (Excitedly, because that's how Belinda rolls.) AWESOME! That'd be so fun! I found this really cool pin with tennis balls!

Me: (Silently. In my own head.) Crap-a-zoidal....

Mabel: (Excitedly planning, because that's how Mabel rolls.) Everyone could bring some project they found on Pinterest and we could do them! 

Me: (Closing my eyes and willing myself invisible, like Ellie does when she doesn't want to do something.) 

Mabel: (Grabbing her phone to show something to Belinda.) We could make our own dishwasher detergent!

Me: (Chanting silently. In my own head. Sitting very still with my eyes glued shut.) I'm invisible...I'm invisible...I'm invisible...

Mabel: Martha! This is going to be fun! You're coming. Right? (Which she probably said with her own version of "don't-you-dare-touch-my-coffee-stare." But I didn't see it. Because I was invisible.)

Me: (Silently. In my own head. But very loudly.) CRAP-A-ZOIDAL!!!! I was supposed to be invisible! (Out loud. In my curmudgeon voice, because that's how I roll.) Only if you guys call it a PinINterest Party.

Mable and Belinda: (without a second thought) OK! (Then they high fived each other.)

Me: (Muttering, under my breath, curmudgeonally.) Crapazoidal....

And that's how I found myself, just hours before the party, trolling PinINterest for something other than "Birthday Parties for Lazy People".

But first, a touching back story:

See, I had a grandpa and he was pretty cool.  He gave scratchedy mustache kisses and hugs that seemed to always smell of pipe smoke even decades after I last saw him smoke a pipe. He told me I was beautiful, which, especially, as a scrawny and horse toothed thirteen year old, I needed to hear and didn't want to disbelieve.  And, sometime, after he retired, he bought a computer. Grandpa used his computer to research things like genealogy, surf the internet, connect with near and distant relatives and old and new friends all around the world, and send emails.  You know the ones. The ones with a bunch of forwards on them.  One's that had amazing pictures of structures made completely out of oranges, or cats sleeping in weird places, or heart wrenching stories of penniless mothers doing their grocery shopping, or close up photos of the Blue Angels flying formations, or useful stuff like how you can open up pesky plastic packages with a can opener. He sent so many that I eventually had to make a mailbox just for him so I didn't misplace any of my other emails in the deluge. But then, Grandpa passed away, and after my uncle sent one last email from his account letting everyone in Grandpa's inbox know that his email address was now inactive, I thought about emptying the inbox, but, never managed it. Because I missed my grandpa.

End of touching back story.

A few years have passed, and it's hours before the PinINterest Party and there I am desperately scrolling through all the pretty pictures on PinINterest trying to find something to bring to Mabel and Belinda's party other than a recipe for making my own dishwasher detergent when I got the strangest sense of deja-vu. Because, dude, I had just seen a picture of a cat sleeping on a dog's head. And a plane! And! And! A useful tip about how to open up all those pesky plastic packages with a can opener! Dude.  I had seen this stuff before. In an email.  From my grandpa.

And that's when I realized:

PinINterest isn't just for overly extravagant children's parties anymore, it's also the place all those old forwarded emails have gone to die.  

And by die, I mean, they went to pretty pretty internet heaven, filled with recipes of caramel brownies, houses with water slides instead of staircases, huge libraries with cozy reading nooks, fuzzy knitted sweaters and running workouts... just like real heaven*! 

So. I did it. I joined PinINterest. Because it's the newest coolest whippest thing out there on the world wide web. Join me? Please?  I have a great recipe for dishwasher detergent!

*OK, sure, I don't actually know if heaven has a water slide, but, come on, God is awesome and so are water slides, you do the math.

Random. Just Like Normal.

The following stuff never made it into any real blog posts.  There may have been a reason. But, then I thought, DUDE!, everyone loves an underdog story!

She knows nothing, people. NOTHING! (And I need to add more sit-ups to my workout routine.)
Ellie: (at the park, while climbing up to the slide) I'm a big sister.
Me: (spotting from below) No. You're a little sister.
Ellie: (looking over her shoulder to pierce me with the cutest death stare ever) No. I'm a big sister. (finishes climbing to the top of the slide and yells) I'M A BIG SISTER! ELLIE IS A BIG SISTER!!
Me: (chuckling awkwardly, backing away, and sucking in my gut while giving a death stare to everyone at the park that day to just DARE and congratulate me)

We may have a bit of a problem....

We have run out of bookshelf space and took a trip to Powell's the other weekend.
Which means....
These books may have a permanent home on the floor of our living room. 

Fun story.  Mabel dropped by to borrow a book.  I told her, no problem, I'm pretty sure I know where that one is. Then I walked into the office and said, "I know I saw it in here somewhere once." And Mabel said, "You narrowed it down to one room?" And I said, "You do realize that each and every room in our house is floor to ceiling books, right? The fact that I could narrow it down to just this one room actually is quite impressive." And then I handed her the book.  End of fun story.


I'm in a video! At Zion!

I may have made it myself....


The unfortunateness of being a pear:

Pear. Rear.  They're  practically the same, um... word...

It's never too early to discuss politics:

Me: (reading from the new bulletin board at the library) Duck for President! Bad Kitty for President! Baby Mouse for President!
Kids: YAY!!!
Me: Who would you vote for Ellie?
Ellie: The Penguin.
Katie: She means the Duck.
Ellie: (turns toward Katie) NO! The Penguin! (does penguin walk) Waddle, waddle, waddle!
Me: And another independent voter is born!


And, lastly, and quite possibly leastly:


Cutest picture of Jon and me EVER:

What I Did With That Taper Week

Awesome Things (from my half marathon on Sunday):

1) Eating a peanut butter and honey sandwich in an elevator.

2) Starting the race with Clive and Mabel. Who enthusiastically* performed awesome Jazzercize moves with me while surrounded by a gajillion strangers in the pre-dawn cold.

JAZZ HANDS, PEOPLE! JAZZ HANDS!

3) RUNNING!!!

4) Pirates! At mile mile 7.5 and 10! And, yes.  They were shooting at us.  With blanks.  Probably.  I mean, the road was a little sticky... but most likely it was just Gu.... Right? (races off to check running shoes) Um... does Gu come in raspberry?

5) Being lapped by the elite marathoners. Twice.  Because they run at the speed of light.

6) Leaping over the road kill the elites left, Wile E. Coyote style, in their wake and yelling, "DEAD SQUIRREL!"

7) Complete strangers cheering me on at almost every corner! Because putting people's names on the race numbers you pin to the front of your shirt is sheer BRILLIANCE!

8) Hearing the announcer say as I raced down the finish chute,"Looks like we have a real treat for you all! Blah, blah, blah" (because it's physically impossible to understand announcers when you are sprinting out the end of a race) and feeling like a ROCK STAR! But then looking over and seeing the first place marathoner cross the finish line just in front of you.  I may have stole some of his applause. But only a little bit.  Just under 50%, or so...ish.

9) Eating post race food! In a bathtub. Fully clothed. Because Ellie needed a nap and waxed paper wrapped seitan burgers are noisy. Plus, I had just run 13.1 miles and eating in a bathtub just made good solid logical sense at the time.

10) And then Ellie woke up and there was Powell's.  And all was right with the world.

Because that world also came with a donut:

And a guy hiking with a Segway:

*As long as a 3/10 on the Enthusiastic Scale still rates as enthusiastic.  Which, it should, because three is totally a magic number.  School House Rock told me so.

Taper Week

A lack of a blog post this week brought to you by this book:

Seriously. Can't put it down.  And, you can't be upset, because that woman up there? She helped cure polio. She went to the moon.  She was blown up by a neuclear bomb and then went on to help develop DNA indicators, cancer drugs, and cloning! All that and she's not even a vampire*.

What are you reading?


*Or a "Lich King who is using a glamour to look sparkly in the sun". According to Jon.