A Munchkin after my own heart

Last week Mr. Hot Pilot, Munchkin and I spent our spring break down in sunny Florida visiting Mr. HP's family and torturing ourselves with the blinding sunshine, happy times of Disney World and the God-awful white sandy beaches of Tampa Florida. While down there with my two favorite guys I got to know my little Munchkin on a whole new level : I realized that at least three-quarters of his brain is filled with jokes about butts, poop and farts. If it weren't for the fact that I have neither the stretch marks nor the petrified fear of enduring childbirth, I would most certainly be convinced that this is my biological child. (Doesn't really matter if he is or isn't, he is still my Munchkin)

He is never shy about releasing his piquant bodily odors and our being in Disney World made this fact no different. It didn't matter that we were crowded shoulder to shoulder with about 10,000 other Disney freaks to watch the evening parade. While sitting on the shoulders of the man I love, he let loose his deadly gases. I didn't know quite what was going on behind me when I heard Mr. HP begin yelling "Dude, what the heck?" until the warm fragrance of doom overtook me and the man next to me gave me an evil glare and shuffled away from me. After a moment of appropriate shaming, I noticed something new about my little Munchkin - embarrassment. It used to be that we could joke around with Munchkin about things but this time was different. Instead we heard the exasperated sigh of a 7 year old who couldn't take the chiding of his super immature parents. "Dad-day! Car-ray!" was all he said in a rather valley girl-esque manner and sulked back to the car with us. Coming from the boy who is proud of his accomplishments and adores the smell of skunk (I swear) we were a bit taken aback by this new emotional development.

The next day he was back to his normal gross little boy ways of attempting to rub dead bugs and nose goblins on us. Instead of scolding him, I knelt down and kindly reminded him that due to his shorter stature, he is at perfect butt level of all of the other adults in queue and that he would be the first to suffer the effects if a butt-splosion were to occur.

Munchkins face contorted into a half grin/half look of fear.

This parenting thing? Totally rocks.

Lowery Park Zoo - Tampa

Pics from our family's spring break holiday. Lucky for us Mr. Hot Pilot hails from sunny Tampa Florida so visiting family is always a beach vacation.

Censorship for kids!

When we were kids growing up, there were many things our parents put the kibosh on and kept us sheltered from : rap music, rock music, any music found on mainstream radio, The Simpsons, horror movies, crack smoking, swearing, vodka shooters and any movie with a rating higher than PG. Looking back I can certainly understand the extreme measures they went to to ensure that my brothers never saw a set of boobies before the age of 21 and I never saw a mans 'danger zone' until at least 3 years after I married.

I still remember going through the annual 5lb JC Penney catalog as a teen trying to find my style, and realizing that my mother had ripped out the 'lingerie' section in order to keep my brothers from fulfilling their curiosity by viewing middle aged women modeling granny panties or maternity bras. Very enticing.

When it came to movies and television, my parents were very guarded about what we were and were not allowed to watch. These rules lightened up quite a bit by the time my youngest brother was a teenager, but I had to live my younger years without the likes of "Roseanne" or "The Simpsons". Not good for a kid trying to be cool in the 5th grade.

Any time we watched a movie, my mother would sit in her chair, poised with the remote control to scan forward in case a woman were to dance bare chested across the screen. There had been more than one occasion where we would be watching a movie as a family when a love scene would suddenly appear and out of the corner of our eyes a small figure clad in flannel kitten pajamas would move in slow motion from the side shouting "No-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o!!!!" and block everyones view with her nightshirt. It was quite a picture.

Now-a-days we are used to seeing every movie imaginable with my parents. And I believe that they have become used to having grown children whom they don't have to censor movies for. It is because of this new and more grown-up life that we got caught in a sticky situation on Thanksgiving day.

As usual we were looking for a movie to go and see after Thanksgiving dinner. My dad suggested "The Four Christmases" with Reece Witherspoon and that guy that Jennifer Aniston once shouldn't have dated. I thought it looked funny and we decided to all go, Mr. Hot Pilot and Munchkin included.

We should have known something was amiss when we didn't see any other elementary aged children in the audience. Then Mr. Hot Pilot whispered "are you sure this is rated only PG?" to me as the rather grown-up previews flashed across the screen.

I hadn't even thought about what rating this movie was. I'm not accustomed to even thinking about it.

Then the first scene of the movie flashes up and after the two characters begin ripping each others clothes off in a bathroom, I realize we have trouble.

Without a second thought, Mr. Hot Pilot had Munchkin in a football hold and was racing down the steps and out of the theater. Looking back it was rather funny, although I was quite embarassed that we even went to see the movie with Munchkin.

Luckily we got our money back and all was right with the world again.

Maybe, just maybe, I will become the mom who will wear flannel kitten pajamas and ensure Munchkin never sees any womans bits and pieces until he is at least 35.

Makes me, like, so happy!

Today was the day that I had to pack my boys up and send them on their way down south to Texas where the weather was sunny and warm with a chance of spontaneous rainbows and possible light shower of Skittles falling from the sky.

I know that they aren't going to miss me nearly as much as I will miss them. Especially after our conversation on the way to the airport.

Munchkin was in the backseat practising his whistle (he loves the 'cat calling' whistle, and I am just waiting for him to do this just as a buxom blonde walks by) and after remarking on his whistle, decided to fill us in on how he learned to do such a thing.

"I learned how to whistle one day while I was in the bathroom. I sat on the potty and taught myself how. I was, like, so happy!"

And, like, so am I.

It all started with a little cat puke

Ok. I'm 11 minutes late with my post for Tuesday. I figure I can have some leeway however seeing as how I did in fact post twice on one day. I promise. Just look through my blog list. Also I was very busy today. Busier than my normal Tuesday which consists of sleeping until I can not sleep anymore, then waking up in order to loll through my normal routine, decide against wearing make-up because it would take too much effort, not even make any sort of attempt with my impossibly straight hair and then throw on clothes that make me feel least fat. Sigh.

Today was different. Today, my boys were in town and we had things to do! Things to see! Chick-fil-a to be eaten! Here is a play by play of my very awesome Tuesday :

1 - Wake up and suddenly realize I forgot to make the return home flight reservations for Mr. Hot Pilot and Munchkin.

2 - Decide to wake up Mr. Hot Pilot and inform him of this fact.

3 - Hide my face as Mr. Hot Pilot freaks out.

4 - Finally wake up and get myself ready in order to be met with a pile of cat puke outside of my door.

5 - Clean aforementioned cat puke.

6 - Cuddle with cat who puked because the puke cat is actually really awesome. P.S - don't let anyone know I actually said I like a cat. I will deny it to my grave.

7 - Get on the road Jack!

8 - Ate at Chick-fil-a. Had their peppermint chocolate chip milkshake. Am lactose intolerant. WAS TOTALLY WORTH IT.

9 - Head to Baltimore to show off the Maryland Science Center to my boys.

10 - Listened as Munchkin complained that his legs hurt/were tired. Told him I had no idea he was such an old fogie and mentioned an early bedtime perhaps? Strangely Munchkin agreed.

11 - Headed to work to pick up stickers I left behind. Munchkin was offered candy. Munchkin refused. Again, very strange.

12 - Arrived home with a suddenly lethargic and hot Munchkin. Munchkin wanted nothing to do with Ms. Terry's meatballs or the loving licks of our puppy Pepper.

13 - Munchkin had a fever of 101.4.

14 - Gave Munchkin Tylenol, Munchkin fell asleep in bed and Mr. Hot Pilot and I went out in search of Motrin.

15 - Bought aforementioned Motrin, then headed to Old Navy where I tried on a weird hat. Then headed over to Kohls where Mr. Hot Pilot took more pictures of me in weird hats and we bought Mr. Hot Pilot some snazzy jeans. The junk in his trunk looks good.

16 - Came home and suddenly Munchkin was better! And saying "Hi Mr. George! I'm playing and drinking apple juice now!"

17 - Munchkin was right as rain. Fever gone. Miraculous little Munchkin.

18 - Munchkin goes to bed for real this time.

19 - Mr. Hot Pilot and I watch this really stupid movie about a bunch of teens who stumble upon ancient ruins in Mexico - that contain people eating plants. Both wonder why they didn't just torch the place and head back to the beach.

20 - Bedtime. Gotta get up in the a.m to head to Staten Island to visit relatives of Mr. Hot Pilot.

G'night!

Heating things up

So tomorrow is the day that my boys will be flying up to the cold, arctic heart of Maryland. I must say that I feel badly, yanking them out of their 70 degree bliss down in the decrepit desert that is Del Rio, Texas to bring them up to a place where just standing outside for a few minutes will freeze your noobies off.

I reminded and reminded Mr. Hot Pilot to pack their heavy jackets, but for some reason I get the feeling that we will be making an emergency pit stop at the local Old Navy to outfit Munchkin in something heavier than "spring weight" cotton.

Oh and did I mention that Mr. Hot Pilot (and Munchkin too) is Puerto Rican (and a super hot one at that!) and hails from Tampa? And that he will turn the heat on IN THE SUMMERTIME if he deems it necessary? Yeah, he is going to die at my house.

I currently live with my parents (because I am a) too cheap too lonely to live alone; b) cheap loving my address; c) a raging freeloader not down with the economy and d) waiting patiently for a ring on my left hand not moving out until I marry Mr. Hot Pilot) who like to keep the temperature at a chilly 68 degrees.

Mr. Hot Pilot will attempt to physically harm me (and by harm I mean TURN THE HEAT ON IN THE SUMMER) if I dare accidentally, possibly, maybe fall into the thermostat on his wall and potentially hit a button that might or might not have lowered the temperature to 74 degrees. Yeah, its kind of like that. So needless to say, I had better drag up some blankets, quilts and an extra space heater for my boys, lest I find icicles hanging from their nose hairs in the morning.

I am, afterall, a fabulous hostess!

No Promises, I'm Feeling Lazy

Saturday is not a day off for me. My entire work week consists of hovering over trauma patients on Friday, Saturday and Sunday with Monday - Thursday either being travel days or days I park my ever expanding booty in front of a computer and work from home for an ungrateful little pharmacy that really should have been punished more as a child and sent to bed early with no dinner instead of only receiving the requisite time out.



In honor of my brain feeling like mush from the rather hectic day (you mean just because someone smashed up their car on the road due to their drinking too many Vodka tonics I ACTUALLY HAVE TO WORK??) I have decided to post a couple of pictures from my latest trip to the wasteland that is Del Rio, Texas. If it weren't for the fact that the hottest Puerto Rican man on the face of the planet lived there along with his cute little sidekick, Munchkin, I would never venture that far south. Ever.




Hope your weekend is fantabulous!

The forerunner of yellow light history

Remember back a bit when I mentioned the story of little Ana Christina who decided it would be lots of fun to draw my Munchkin peeing on the ground? Well, little miss psycho pants has struck again.

My days are never at a loss for hilarious awesomeness whenever I am down here with my Munchkin and Mr. Hot Pilot. Fart jokes, skunk smell, and other sorts of bathroom humor abound. Monday when Mr. Hot Pilot and I went to get our Munchkin from school, he produced yet another stapled together book with hand-drawn pictures done by all of his classmates. This time instead of a picture of Munckin peeing on the ground, there was a picture of Munchkin looking rather cheerful holding the leash to our cat Twinkle, standing right near the house. But this was no ordinary house you see. Miss Psycho Pants decided to draw a bomb on the house.

Believe me when I say that I laughed, but it was a nervous "holy crap, this kid is nuts!" laugh. Apparently neither Munchkin nor the teacher caught this little terrorist gesture or I believe this girl would be headed down red light lane with no hope of another green light for years to come.

The only piece of advice I could offer my dear, sweet, skunk smell loving Munchkin is this. (You see his daddy, my Hot Pilot was married to Munchkin's mother for some time - Munchkins not-exactly-sane, often delusional, verbally abusive, needs to be locked in a mental institution for a very long time very mentally unstable mother.)

"If you ever find yourself attracted to this girl down the line and want to marry her? Don't."

Touch my Subway, you die

Yesterday I flew back down to Texas to visit with my Munchkin and Hot Pilot. It is always an interesting adventure seeing who will be travelling with you, and watching all of the other travellers who are in the same painful predicament that you are. I only say that travel is painful since usually I have to wake up about 3 hours BEFORE the crack of dawn. On this trip I did the same thing only to find that when I got to the airport they hadn't posted what gate I needed to go to, nor did any of the Air Tran gates have any information other than "Stand By" written on them. Sweet.

I finally sat down and turned to my blackberry for assistance. I found that my gate was D3 and proceeded to a gate that looked like a war torn country complete with wires sticking out of walls haphazardly and a few baby-faced military men. Indeed this was my gate. I then finally boarded the plane only to find that my window seat just so happened to be the only seat on the entire plane WITHOUT A WINDOW.

I had to change planes in Hotlanta where at my gate I was accosted by two toddlers while their mother (who by the way was wearing diaper-butted black capris with palm trees on the thighs and then completed this sexy ensemble with thick chenille socks scrunched down on her cankles and beat up black clogs. Classy.) gave me a smile like "aren't my children just DARLING?". Not so much. When the daughter tried to paw through my purse is when things got ugly. I bum rushed blondie, tackled her to the ground and shoved a copy of the latest Glamour magazine" in her face gave the woman the look of death (you know the one where you cut your eyes and slowly turn away in disgust - learned it from my mom) and she finally got the hint and proceeded to steal another un-suspecting woman's seat.

I finally then boarded the plane heading to San Antonio and was seated next to a rather chatty red-headed woman. About 30 minutes into the flight however while holding her cup of tomato juice (barf) she had a sudden attack of what can only be called narcolepsy and fell asleep, spilling the contents of aforementioned barf smelling tomato juice all over me. We both exited the plane looking like someone had hurled their lunch all over both of us. My boyfriend thought it was just super hot.

Hi honey, I'm home!

Birthday probe

Nearly one month ago was my mom's 2nd 26th birthday. As usual there was dining out, gifts and cards to be enjoyed by her. When you have had to raise three awesome and crazy kids and one husband who needs to be raised right along with them, you pretty much deserve an awesome birthday each year.

My mom's health insurance company thought so too.

I came downstairs this morning to find a "happy birthday" of sorts sitting on the kitchen counter from Kaiser Permanente. I saw the words "Happy birthday" and "birthday month" which of course made me think "wow, what a cool insurance company". Then I saw the true reason for the festive correspondence.

TIME TO SCHEDULE YOUR COLONOSCOPY.

Wow. What a way to poop on your birthday month. What a way to ruin all the joy and festivities you enjoyed.

I had toyed around with scanning the document in and posting it here since it really would have made your day, however there is this little federal law called HIPAA which tends to ruin fun things like leakage of personal protected health information. Whatever.

I then thought back to other fun things that have happened on peoples birthdays. Including my last birthday.

It was the first birthday I had spent with Mr. Hot Pilot and Munchkin. I was down in Texas enjoying what seemed to be a somewhat normal afternoon. Normal that is until Munchkin decided it was time for his daily constitutional, and by constitutional I mean losing half his body weight down a plumbing-challenged toilet. I heard the multiple flushes but didn't really think anything of it. It wasn't until I heard the little voice calling "Daddy? I need help..." that I thought maybe something might be up.

Then I heard Mr. Hot Pilot yell as though he saw a poop monster half eating our little Munchkin.

I stayed put. I'm no dummy.

Apparently my sitting perfectly still on the couch, not so much as BREATHING didn't do much for hiding myself. I should have jumped in the car and headed to Wal-Mart (no where else to run to really). Mr. Hot Pilot promptly sent Munchkin to his room and asked me if I might come and assist him in cleaning up a mess. A poop mess. (There seems to be a theme of poop going on here in my posts...I should look into that).

I walked into the main bathroom and there before me was a sea of toilet water flowing into the tub room, around the bend into the master bathroom and directly into the master bedroom. Sweet. Mr. Hot Pilot then proceeded to pull every towel, blanket and comforter out of rooms and closets to sop up the mess. I sort of stood there for a second and did the only thing I could possibly do.

I laughed my birthday booty off. Seriously, grow up in my family and anything having to do with a bodily function will elicit that exact reaction.

For the next hour or so we mopped and sopped while Munchkin was keeping watch of things from underneath his bedroom door. Every so often I'd see part of a Transformer or a little 6 year old finger poke out below as if to remind us he was still in captivity.

Finally we called maintenance to come in with an industrial poop sucker-upper (aka- a wet/dry vac) and pretty soon all was well. Munchkin was sprung from his prison and I was left with the question by Mr. Hot Pilot

"So what are you making us for dinner tonight?".

Happy birthday.

Enough to make me wet my pants...

After spending lots of time with my munchkin, I realize just how amazingly funny he is. Kids really do and say the funniest and silliest things with a reckless abandon I could only dream of having.

I went to pick up munchkin from school today and of course asked how his day was. He began prattling off about the monarch butterflies and then proceeded to tell me all about the "goosebumps" show he had watched the previous weekend with Mr. Hot Pilot. When we got home we pulled out all the work he did in school the previous week, and included was a little book called "all about munchkin" where each of his classmates answered questions about munchkin such as his favorite food and what he wanted to be when he grew up. I was asking him I'd he was friends with the kids (he is as he is very personable). He said yes to each child except for one little girl named Ana. When I asked why she wasn't nice (his words) he said very matter of factly "she drew a picture of me peeing on the ground, and then got a yellow light from the teacher.".

I couldn't control the eruption of laughter that followed.

We then discussed what he wanted to be when he grows up. When I asked him he said "an astronaut and a comet" without blinking an eye. I of course asked him if he knew what a comet was and he said "yeah, a shooting star", his face saying "like, DUH!".

Between his fart jokes and his little matter of fact blurbs, my munchkin keeps me in stitches.

Never a dull moment. I wouldn't have it any other way.

My boys

So these are my boys. And this is the look they often get on their faces when engaged in a game of whatever (and I say that because they play anything and everything and its always the same look.)

 

How to raise an honest Munchkin

As adults and parents, we often find we use the little things in life to try and teach our children (or step-munchkins) how to be upstanding and productive citizens. In other words, we don't want to be responsible for raising the next Ted Bundy, OJ Simpson or some other sort of bottom feeder of society. (Of course if you ARE looking to raise a con artist of some sort, then by all means check out this book)

I like to try and teach Munchkin to have a sense of respect for other people and their belongings, no matter how small or mundane they may seem. To some, that old beat up item may actually be something that brings great joy.

Please imagine my not so gleeful surprise when I came into work today and found my once cool and unassuming "mini-kitty" which once looked like this:


Now looks like this:




As you can see, my once awesome desk prop is now 600 times it's original size. Sigh.

So I did what any person would do, and emailed the office. Here is what I had to say:
-------------------------------------------
Subj : Curiosity killed my cat?

Hello,

I see that the curiosity of someone over my “grow a pet cat” was too much for them to bear and I found my poor innocent cat drowning in a pool of water on the middle desk of the CCR portion of the office. I have to say that I’m not too happy about this. I like having little things around my desk to add to the fun and by all means if you wanted to grow your own pet, I would have gladly referred you to where you could purchase your own. Granted it might not have seemed like much to the cat-drowner, however the whole thing, package included, added to it's kitsch and I would greatly appreciate either a replacement or an apology.

Thank you to those who enjoyed looking at my little “pet” but respected that it belonged to someone and was here for the enjoyment of all.

P.S – For those who were kind enough to keep their curiosity to themselves, the cat indeed did grow to be 600% of its original size.

(You can find such an item/replacement here.)
--------------------------------------------

So the moral of our story here is teach your kids right in the beginning, and they will grow up to respect the belongings of others and refrain from the drowning of poor, innocent, fake cats.

Cute Attack

From SanAntonio

Seriously. Try not to let the cuteness kill you.

A six year old and his boogers

Joel [as Space Girl]: "Kids' brains always taste better when they've been thinking about donuts."


I'm back down in Del Rio this week spending time with my boys. Today was Mr. Hot Pilot's birthday (I'll be sure to post pictures soon!) so I decided to pick up Munchkin from school and take him out to pick out cool stuff for dad. On the way there of course I forgot my wallet and cell phone, so we had to drive all the way back home and then back out to town again, killing some rather precious time. Munchkin is an awesome little guy if I do say so myself. As we were driving, I mentioned that on my way there I had smelled a skunk and it made me think of him.

Now before you go all ape on me, let me fill you in on Munchkin. For some reason, he really likes the smell of skunk. At first Mr. Hot Pilot and I thought he was just being silly but as time went on we realized he just might indeed enjoy the pungent burnt tire smell of a skunk. So of course we got to talking about skunks and other gross things (as he IS a 6 year old boy, come on!). I don't know how many moms and step-moms out there have had the joy of discovering boogers attached to random places throughout your home, but I get the feeling I am not alone.

I gave Munchkin a heads up that his dad had found a yucky booger stuck to the side of the tub and that Munchkin was going to have to clean it when we got home. I look back in the rear-view mirror and I saw a smile spread widely over his lips.

Munchkin : "That wasn't me, that was daddy!"
Me : "Oh yeah? You sure? I seem to think otherwise"
Munchkin : "Haha! It was Daddy!"

So later on as we were driving to dinner the subject came back up about the mysterious appearing booger.

Mr. HP : "Hey Munchkin, you are going to have to clean your booger off the side of the tub tonight, that is just sick dude".

Munchkin : "Haha, no! I don't want to touch that!"

Me : "Oh yeah? You don't seem to mind all of the boogers you have stuck to your wall above your head in your bedroom do you? They are just sitting there ready to fall on you!"

Munchkin : "I know...it's heaven!"...."It's booger heaven!"

Me : "Oh, so they kind of sit there and watch over you while you sleep?"

Mr. Hot Pilot : "Like stars in the sky?"

Munchkin : "Oh yeah! I want to buy that paint stuff and make them glow in the dark!"

He then proceeded to tell us that his tool of choice was his right hand pointer finger, but "he only used that when he was a little kid".

Me : "Oh so are your boogers coming back through a worm hole back in time and attaching itself in Munchkin places all over the house?"

Munchkin : "I don't know..."

Mr. Hot Pilot : "Sick dude."

Then of course Munchkin thought it to be great fun to try and wipe the imaginary booger on Mr. Hot Pilot. Funny thing happened though. As soon as we stepped through the doors of the restaurant, Munchkin waves us off and hushes us by saying "Ok guys, we are in a restaurant. I don't want to hear any more talk about my boogers."

Well at least the kid's got manners.