Sunday Morning Radio

KILLS me. Sunday morning radio just kills me.

My husband, the Chunk, went out and bought a new car in 2007. He bought a 2008 Chevy Aveo, WITHOUT telling me he was going out and buying a new car, and THEN, to boot, he went down the cheapest road possible, and left out the power windows/locks (which I'm fine with THAT), the A/C; it's a stick shift to make it even cheaper, but then? Oh, yeah. There's a radio. That's IT. A brand new 2008 vehicle, and it didn't even come with a damn cassette player. Yeah, he went THERE.

See. It's not that we don't own Mp3 devices, full of wonderful music to fill our fuzzy ears when we hit up the local chinese buffet. It's the fact that we no longer own one of those "radio/mp3 player sync-y thingies" that allow you to listen to said player in the car. So I've been relying on the radio to get me by until we get one of those "thingies". And if you know me, you KNOW I hate the radio. Most of the time, I can get by on Top 40 radio. My kids dig the catchy pop songs, and I don't want to throw myself out of the moving car... too much.

Then we get to Sunday morning.

It's not a long drive to work on Sunday morning, only about 20 minutes. (Ok. I realize this is long for some of you. Lucky bastards.) Do you have ANY idea what's on the radio at 7am on a Sunday morning???

NOTHING.

Church radio. Garden radio. Tech nerd radio, and not even the cool tech nerd talk, but the kind of talk about microsoft things, and gigabytes this and macro______ that. If I chance upon some music, it's country, and to put it nicely, I'm not a fan. So I spend every Sunday morning, pushing buttons, scanning the stations, hoping I'll come across just ONE song that could make my 20 minute drive ANY better.

I hear there is polka radio on Sunday mornings on the Akron University station. Not when I'm driving.

I hear there's a good oldies station that plays a ton of 60's rock on Sunday mornings. Oh, I found it, alright. Jimi Hendrix sounded like he was singing from the other side, and it scared me.

There was nothing.

Then..... then I heard.... drums. A guitar! Oh! I think I finally found something!

Maroon 5.

I might as well have just ended it all this morning. It's a cruel world.

The Importance of Night Driving...

Night driving. It's one of life's greatest pleasures, depending on what road you take. Every Friday night, I pick the kids up from my mother in law's, then I decide to take the slightly longer road home. This road is a country highway, winding between huge fields and farmhouses. No streetlights. Hi beams required.

The kids always pass out within the first 5 minutes, which makes for a quiet, fight free kind of drive. This is MY time. So what do I do, enjoy the peace and quiet? No. I listen to music. Not just any music. No loud, heavy rock for me. Not at night. Not classical. Sweet Jesus, I don't want to fall asleep at the wheel! I'm still listening to bands like Incubus, 311, and the sort. I pick the mellow shit; the shit I would daydream to, the stuff I could fall asleep to at home in bed, if I weren't driving.

I have some favorites I listen to EVERY time. Instead of dreading the half hour drive home, I don't want it to end. I do all of my thinking on Friday nights, well, most of it. I DO think the other 6 days of the week. I just feel like this is the time when I can turn all my attention to it. I think of what could have been. What could be? What would happen if I said this instead of that?

                           This is Roads, by Blindside. GREAT night listening.

Driving a night is .... Well, I can't explain. When I graduated high school, I lived a good hour and a half away from my hometown, where all of my friends were. I lived in a small town with one streetlight, and our house was situated on top of a hill, with the view of the lake all around. Beautiful. Driving home at night? Even better. I worked a good 45 minutes away from home. To get home, we had to take Rt. 542, otherwise known as Magnolia Road. It was a country highway, dark and super curvy, with lots of big open fields, and if the moon was out and full, you could see for miles. It was awesome. Driving through the woods, tunnels of dark trees, watching for deer; it was never scary. (Although, if I were to break down in this shit, I would have peed my pants and locked every door, and waited for the escaped criminal with the hook for a hand.)

                                The Original by Incubus. I listen to this on repeat.

Anyway, before I stray too far off topic, I'm pretty curious as to what YOU listen to when you're driving at night. I have my favorites, that remind me of certain people in my life, the past and present. I feel like I'm with these people again when I'm listening, and it's just a really great/sad feeling. I'd love to hear what your suggestions are; I would love to add to my playlist!

                      
                                          Far Behind by Candle Box

                         Can't Stop, Gotta Date With Hate by Lostprophets

                                          Thank You by Chronic Future

                                         Diamonds and Coal by Incubus

This list could go on forever, but I won't put you through that. These are songs I've listened to just recently. Have any recommendations? Send them this way!



B-l-a-n-k-e-t?? You bet your ass.

So these days, kindergarten isn't about fun and games, singing around the piano and playing with baby animals. (what, YOU didn't play with baby animals? You must have had a HORRIBLE kindergarten experience!) Nope. These days, they expect these kids to be reading by the middle of the year, learning basic computer skills, and simple math, things I don't recall learning until 1st grade. Not that there's anything wrong with this! I get so excited to learn what Chlo has learned everyday when she comes home from school. Our conversations usually go like this:

Me: "Hi Chlo! Soooo... How was school today!?"

Chloe: "good."

Me: "Well, that's awesome! What all did you do today?"

Chloe: "I dunno."

Me: "You don't know? You don't know what all you did today?"

Chloe: "I ate chicken nuggets at lunch, and I need you to button my pants."

Me: "sigh"

These are our after school convos. About an hour later, I can guarantee you she'll be in her room, telling Ness ALL about her great day, and I'll overhear "yeah, and ____ puked in the art room, and ______ calls himself Boogerhead!!" followed by a ridiculous amount of laughter from both chuds.

Later, I'll ask again. "How was school?"

"Ok. I dunno."

"Oh."

So. I've decided, since she's learning sentence structure in school, I will rephrase my questions with "So, tell me ONE complete sentence about lunchtime/recess/computer lab/music/math today!".

And holy shit. IT WORKS.

I am learning SO much from her mad kindergarten skills, I can feel my brain swelling and growing and getting smarter. Either that, or I have cerebral edema. Hmm...

I'm super proud of her. Lately, they're learning how to spell words on their own by sounding the words out first. We practiced tonight. She is surprisingly AWESOME at this. I hit her with words like robot, blanket, box and fox, napkin and money. She got all of them right, and I was definitely impressed. She may have her dad beat on the spelling skills already! This is no longer a household, it is a spelling dojo, and I am her master. It's bitchin.

As I type, Chuck is upstairs working on the kids' room. When we moved in, it was not finished, and it still isn't. He's been working so much, there's just no time to finish. I don't know a damn first thing about construction, so I'm most definitely not the best candidate to finish it. I can't wait for it to be finished though; it'll look great. We live in a one and a half story house, and the whole upstairs will be the kids' room/playroom. We plan on painting a Super Mario Bros. mural on the wall once it's finished, and that'll be exciting/a fucking challenge. I can't wait!

Heartburn has struck this stricken soul, so we must depart for the night. I'm going to go overdose on Tums and pass out. This is my nightly routine, and I realize it is very sad. Take pity on this poor soul as she eventually gives in and downs a spoonful of baking soda and high hopes. Goodnight!

I think I survived 2011... I think.

2011.

What a year. We've done much, said much, ate TOO much, and exercised not enough.

While it's not yet the end of the year, it IS my first blog since 2008, and that's a HUGE deal. Hopefully I remember how to do this, and I don't screw it up like I did my second child. (He's a hot mess, but he's adorable, so this makes up for it. But really! He's smart! He's just....)

Things we did in 2011!

We went on an amazing beach vacation to Emerald Isle, NC. It was beautiful, awesome, the house we rented was GREAT, and ridiculously cheap for the location. We had the ocean in our backyard! Too bad 3 people drowned that week right in that area, and we didn't do too much swimming. The water, it was rough. It was still great though, and I've decided that Beaufort, NC is going to be my future home. They have this thing for pirates, and have Pirate Weekends every summer! This could be the start of an amazing relationship!

The chuds at the beach. As you can see,

Ness is about to get all ninja on that sand's ass.

Things we did in 2011, #2!

We bought a house. It was ridiculous. It was a ridiculous process made even MORE ridiculous by my ridiculous stress/paranoia/anxiety/constant hunger. It took almost 2 months, but by the time we were done, we were proud homeowners. I can't lie, it's a pretty amazing feeling. I didn't think it would ever happen, at least not anytime soon, so finding this house was like finding a straight edge prostitute. IT JUST DOESN'T HAPPEN. Soon after moving in, we watched our fridge die, and our kitchen pipes take a shit on us. We're ok now, and our "used but like new" fridge is working like a champ. So thanks, hillbilly dude who sold it to us, and promised us a good deal if we paid cash. Thanks a TON. :)

Things we did in 2011, #3!

Chlo started kindergarten! She turned 5 in July, which meant only one thing. SCHOOL. Not the sissy kid school, where they learn how to stack blocks and not pee in their pants. We're talking hardcore school, where you learn LETTERS. And NUMBERS. Maybe even some MATH. She's even learning about compound words, and her teacher said (and I quote!) "She just blows me away with her small motor skills! And how smart she is! I just wonder how much she has stowed away in that little head of hers!". I often wonder that myself, usually after I catch her drawing on our "used but like new" fridge with an ink pen.

WHAT GOES ON IN THAT HEAD, KID?????

Really, I should be asking her brother this.

Ness is 3. He refuses to potty train, but can kick just about anyone's ass at any video game. He takes after his dad.

Things that happened in 2011, #4!

I just don't KNOW! Even though it seems like I didn't do much this year, really, there was a ton of stuff we did. We had fun, we grew (at least my waist did), we learned, we did... stuff. It was all in all a pretty awesome year. We have a great set of animals living with us, a new kitty, a new dog, a new tortoise and a new iguana. Wow, that was a mouthful. Kopurnikus is our siamese, he's fat and I love him with all my little catlady heart that I didn't even KNOW that I had, Maebe is our little rat terrier; I brought her from a family; and I think she's had bad experiences with men, because she just doesn't like them at all, Rocky is our new baby red footed tortoise, and Diane is our bitch iguana. She's just a bitch.

I'm done with this post for my new blog. I mean, I don't have a lot to say tonight, I just wanted to try out my new blog. I'll hopefully have new posts soon, with more interesting things to say. Now is the time for me to put my chuds to bed, enjoy some quiet time and eat halloween candy, and relax with my bottle of tums. So to all a goodnight. Or whatever. Till next time!