Happy Birthday to Me.....Again!

WOO HOO, I've gained another year!
Last year leading up to today I've been saying and believing that I was 37.
I was really 36 all a long obviously, but I tricked myself into thinking that I was older. (Of course my subconscious knew the truth and was secretly thrilled that I was actually a year younger).

Now that I've come upon yet another dreaded reminder that I still won't be allowed to audition for American Idol,(heh), this time around it's a little more tolerable! I feel like I've cheated Father Time out of an extra year before the big 4.0. The other day someone asked me how much older I was going to be and I said "Oh yeah...37....again. Cool!"

Yes I know I sound like an idiot, but it gets me through okay! This is where you're suppose to chime in and say "no you don't sound like an idiot April,
that's brilliant!"

well??? *taps foot impatiently*
Anyhow, I hope I'll be able to pull it off again next year!

I meandered over to Dan's Blah-blah-blah Blog
and found out that we share the exact same birthday!(oops I have one to many blahs in there). Anyhow check out his post "You Despise Me, Don't You". HILARIOUS!!!!! You won't regret it!


6/29/07 Update: This might not be a great idea after all! I just realized I missed out on 36! COMPLETELY MISSED OUT ON 36! 36 IS A VOID! :0( Now I'm sad!

HUSHIE-UPPIE!!!

I have finally mastered the art of blowing off telemarketers, bill collectors, salesmen and Jehovah’s Witnesses in the nicest way possible. I’ve always been the type of person to get reeled in and on countless occasions I’ve been held hostage by all of the above.

I could never bring myself to get rid of them in the quickest way possible for fear of hurting their feelings. Unlike my father-in-law who takes rudeness to an awesome level. Jehovah’s witnesses would come to his door and he’d scream at them saying “I told you people to stop bothering me!” then would slam the door in their poor faces. Real nice pops! That actually brings back some bad childhood memories. Wait a minute, I need a moment in my happy place.


Okay I’m better.
Anyhow, I’ve been working myself up to the best and easiest way to get these people to step off. :0) Nicely~

For telemarketers and bill collectors I like to entertain myself by getting them to hang up on me. I answer the phone in my most childlike voice (which for me is not a huge stretch) and I say “I’m sorry my Mommy and Daddy aren’t home right now, do you want to talk to my turtle? Why? He wants to talk to you. But he’s going to cry! I’m telling my Daddy! What’s your name and telephone number? Are you a pedophile? Have you seen Dateline?” They end up hanging up on me! Works every time and it usually stops repeat calls.
I love it!

Sometimes I’ll get a really overzealous or rude person who calls, (you know the obnoxious personality who just won’t allow you to hang up or won’t take no for an answer?) I’ll let them think I’m interested, quietly set the phone down and let them run their spiel. I could nip it in the bud, but because they are so hyper-motivated, I feel sorry for them.

Sometimes it seems that some of these sales people might get some sort of credit for just the right amount of dialog they pop off. They ramble on and on at a 100 words per second. If they cram it all in maybe their victim might happen to be a speed listener and will have a change of heart instead of feeling highly annoyed. I don’t like to let those personalities down. I might ruin their day. Waste their valuable time by interrupting every few seconds by quickly spitting out “no thank you”, “I’m sorry but I’m not interested”, “I’m not allowed to make the decisions in my house, trust me I'll be beaten”, “using your product is against my religion”; So I just let them do their thing, meanwhile, I put the phone down and walk off to do mine.

I think it’s nice of me! Okay it’s a little mean but it beats getting upset, slamming the phone down and feeling bad about it later.

I’d been snowed the year before by a very fast talking door to door salesgirl who wouldn’t take “I HAVE NO MONEY AND I MAY LOSE MY HOUSE NEXT MONTH” for an answer. Even after, “WE HAVE NO FOOD THIS WEEK!” she just kept going on even though I kept saying "no".

Then my girls came over and she roped them in: “let me ask you girls something, wouldn't you use these educational products to help you get better grades? They are really cool computer programs that are more like fun games”. She stooped to the worst level! I was outside gardening and therefore didn’t have a door to slam. Not that I would have even if I had access to one, but I wanted to in the worst way. (In my mind it was a Scrubs scene where I day-dreamt that I slammed the door in her face a 100 times). Anyhow the girls said “oh yeah, we could definitely benefit from those!”
“See they can really use them” she said. I should have told the girls, “Oh you can definitely use them? Okay good, all you need to do is pay the nice lady $80.00 cash. Instead I felt like a major heel and the worst parent in the world. (wow, heel was a serious grandpa word wasn't it?).
$80.00 + 12 weeks later when the cds arrived, we looked through them and found that they were basically complete sloth-crap, so now the cds are used as an expensive dust trap.

I’m going to illustrate for you below, my favorite new thing to do to door/door salespeople. I tried it the other day and it worked like a charm! This guy was ridiculous! He was a “college kid” selling the very same educational material as the salesgirl the previous year.


Salesman: Hi, do you have a moment to take a look at some educational products for your children?

Me: Thanks but I bought the very same products last year and we were really disappointed with the quality.

Salesman: Well can you just take a look to see some of our new products? They’re new this year.

Me: No thank you, really we weren’t happy, and your products aren’t exactly inexpensive.

Salesman: Can you just look for a second, my boss says I have to show you this.

Me: Nope. Won’t do it and you can’t make me!
(For a second there I thought he might hit me.)

Salesman: Just look at this one page *flips open book to a page*
*then looks up to see me holding my hands over my eyes and plugging my ears with my thumbs while singing la la la la la, not looking and not listening to you~ la la la~* He ended up laughing and finally left! See, we both got a good laugh instead of feeling bad and my wallet was spared.

Sheez, some of these poor starving souls need a brick house to fall on them. I don’t use the same sales tactics and my bank account reflects it. I just don’t have the personality for that. Don’t get me wrong I can be obnoxious and annoying but only towards my friends and family. It’s why I’ve decided to start the nursing program where I can actually help people and feel needed.

A PEEK AT OUR CITY

I haven't a thing to post AGAIN! I'm so glad to hear that I'm not the only one who is struggling to come up with something funny these days! There are so many of my favorite blog authors who share a seat with me on the same sad little boat. At least they're still funny when they think they aren't. ie; Central Snark with Nothin’.

I can't even comment funny! I've been dragging these shackles around with a sour puss on my face for weeks now!

My last post was just complete gibberish about what I'm not sure of, even after I re-read and read it again. Two of my children came to me and said, "you know, your last post really wasn't all that funny mom" and "I didn't even laugh once throughout the whole thing. You need to go back to your original style of writing and stop worrying about who's reading it because we can tell you're trying too hard." Thanks! Thanks so much Siskel and Ebert! BTW you're grounded!
CRITIQUE THAT! :0P

Okay, so it wasn't funny and it probably made me look really sick and deranged that I would offer excrement to my children for dinner.

Anyhow, I still have nothing funny to offer up, so I thought I would post a little tour of our city.
theresa of gave us a cool little tour of the shopping she did in Pamplona, Spain. The Rain in Spain...: All in a Day's Shopping
This is a little tour right back at ya theresa. Not as exciting as beautiful Spain, but I love it here none-the-less. I left out all of the modern shopping areas which are starting to boom in our area. Ooh, and don't forget to click on the "more photos" button. (and make sure your volume is up for the full experience).
I didn't embed it into the post because the frame is to large. I need to get a wider layout. Anyhow here it is:

Click Here For Tour Of Our City

STOP HOLDING ME HOSTAGE!!!! (I’m referring to the voices in my head again).

Wooooooo. It’s been crazy at work and then some these last couple of weeks. I haven’t had time to get on and post or even get on to read anyone else’s posts (except for a couple of my favs).

I know whine-whine-whine.
Life is good though! Really good! I have nothing to complain about! Can you believe it? Me not complaining about anything… I know, that’s rich! I find I’m not very funny when I’m not complaining. Then again maybe I’m the only person who thinks I’m funny when I’m droning on and on about something that no one really gives a damn about. Like right now.

Anyhow, I’ve been slacking on my posts so I’ve really got to dig down deep right now and find something to good to whine about. Something everyone can relate to and somehow make it funny. Hmmm…. Nope, I can’t do it. I’ve been in too good a mood lately! How abouts’we explore a bunch (well more like a couple) of silly things that roam around in my head instead? Seeing as I’ve been away for such a long time and I may be away for a few more days once again, I think I’ll just throw a bunch of stuff out here in one post. Sort of like going on vacation and leaving one of those automatic pet feeders for the…..well duh, the pets of course. Not that I’m referring to you as the pets mind you! Is this lazy of me? Too bad, it’s all I have right now. Look it’s almost 4 am over here, cut me some slack!

Okay, you twisted my arm. First I’ll start off with a little something to complain about of course. Gotta bait you with something funny right off the bat, correct?

Let’s start with something that bothers me beyond bothered. Today's Lyrics in most of the music my kids listen too! Geez I never thought I’d hear myself saying that! I loved music as a teen and still do, and when I go back and listen to what I used to listen to in the 80s I guess my parents may have been cringing too.
Most of todays songs are fouler than ever! I’m still very protective of my kids even though 1 is in college and the other 2 are in high school. It kills me when there are songs that are playing that warrant re-explaining the birds and the bees. I hate todays MTV which should be called Ho'TV, or Stripper TV. My girls think it’s funny to torture me by popping in a CD with this crap they know I hate to listen to in their presence.
So I’m thinking that if I call them on some of the stupid lyrics they’ll be embarrassed and will take out the cd never to be played in my car again. I say “hey what did he just say? The lyrics to this one song are actually“I said my n*ggas don’t dance we just pull up our pants, now lean back, lean back, lean back, lean back”. Of course the N word is paused out of the song on the radio so to me it sounds like he’s saying; “my nuts don’t dance they just fill up my pants, now lean back, lean back ….” This other song that came out called "Party Like a Rock Star", I swear they are saying "Horny like a rock star". Eventually, I’ll embarrass the crap out of the girls and they won’t bother to play that garbage anymore. At least not around me! It’s bad enough most of the lyrics are just a 3 to 4 worded line repeated a bazillion times.
CRAP I TELL YOU! (Oh man, I sound stogedy!)

And now a little something I’m sure my kids will complain about.

Remember, complaining is funny right?

Is Ca-ca, poo-poo and pee-pee funny to you? Tickle any familiar funny bones?
Close your eyes and take yourself back to the ages between 4 and 21.
(Yesterday for some people).

The reason I bring this up is that when my kids were younger, and actually still to this day, instead of asking if I need any help cooking dinner, the first and only question is usually, “Mom, what’s for dinner?” Not “Hey mom, can I help you with dinner?” That one single question is basically an “all about them” question. ( I know I used to ask my parents the same thing and I’m sure my pre-hypocritical self didn’t offer to help either).

Throughout my poor kids entire lives I’ve always answered the question
“what’s for dinner?” with.. "Well, tonight we’re having Ca-ca, poo poo and pee pee babe”.
They used to reply with “Eeww MOOOM!” or “Gross your sick! So what are we really having?”
and I would say “Are you complaining again? Because if you are, you won’t get any at all! Now go set the table and make sure there is a roll of toilet paper next to the salt and pepper.”

As the years rolled on they still ask the same question and I still say “we’re having caca poo poo and pee pee honey. Your favorite!”
Now they reply with “Yummy Mom, you’re the best! I call shot gun on the first helping!” It isn’t as fun as it used to be, now it’s just tradition. Isn’t that sweet?

I also had a nifty little trick to try and distract them whenever they got hurt.

You know, take the pain off of their minds.

Let me tell you there was a lot of getting hurt around our house with three kids and all.

I’m very clumsy myself and the apples do not fall far from the tree!

So when they came to me every other hour complaining that they got a booboo, “"Mommy so and so poked my eye!!!” I thought it was amusing to offer to poke their other eye to take their mind off the first eye :0) It always seemed to get a good laugh and distract them from the pain until I could blow in their eye or give them some ice or offer to scoop the injured eye ball out with a spoon or a fork. What? It worked! The crying instantly stopped and when I had to step out of the room or out of the apartment across the hall to the laundry room, I would tell them to behave and that I would know if they weren’t behaving because I was going to leave one of my eyeballs up high so I could watch them. They actually believed me because I would squint one eye closed after mocking removing it and placing it high on top of a cabinet.

Ahh the fun times we had. Their therapy bills are going to be through the roof when they get older. Well they can’t say I never gave them anything substantial, right? Just think of how funny they will be when they get older, what with all that they have to complain about! I provided that inspiration! I lovingly complain about them and they will in turn...…torture me when I get old and can’t wipe myself.
I can just hear them now… I’ll ask “what’s for dinner?” and they’ll say, “I don’t know, whatcha got in your diaper Mom? Little snack pack?” I hope they don’t read this, I shouldn’t be giving them any ideas!
Okay, I’m beat and very punchy as if you couldn’t tell. I’m crashing now. I’ll be back with a post about how to tell long winded ear benders to step off, zip it, and shutty-uppy...but in a nice way.

I’m starving for attention so leave me some comments

telling me I didn’t gross you out too much.