Bless Your Farts

Ahh the gym, a magical placed filled with unique smells and butt cracks galore. Kinda like Walmart, but a little sexier. I love walking in the gym and doing a lap to check out all the people. I love people watching. I still don’t understand people who wear jeans to the gym. Wouldn’t that hurt? I’ve never heard anyone say, “Man I just bought the cutest pair of jeans to wear to the gym. I can’t wait to get all sweaty in them, so my thighs can chafe and break out into a heat rash. This is going to be a great day!” These people are as out of place as a straight guy at a Cher concert. Then there is the guy, no joke I saw him, after a few reps on the leg machine, picks up his liter of regular Pepsi and chugs it down… I have so many questions and it seems a bit counterproductive. Then there are the girls who come in with a full pound of make up on. Personally, I’m lucky to wear make up at all and if I do, it’s definitely not for the gym. I save that for something classy like a special trip to Target or, wait for it, maybe Costco. Last but not least, are the people who wear two Fit Bits… You know who they are. Personally, I just don’t trust them. It just doesn’t seem necessary. Yes we get it, you like to work out. Don’t worry we see you moving.

Well this trip to the gym I’m going to tell you about happened a few years ago. A long long time ago, in a far away place, a time before kids were even a thought and before I was even married. I think I had just gotten engaged and joined the gym to get ready for the wedding. My time at the gym only lasted a couple months and stopped purposely after this encounter. I decided this particular day to try the water aerobics class. It sounded like it would be fun and low impact. Just what I needed and I had just bought a cute new bathing suit that was dying for a little chunky dunking so I went. The pool was refreshing, or in gym terms cold AF! As I was bouncing around trying to warm up, I noticed there was absolutely nobody else coming to this class. I started getting out of the water thinking I must have misread the calendar, when this thin wild-eyed woman came power walking in. “Are you here for water aerobics?” she asked in a very authoritative tone. “Yes.” I said. She looked me square in the eyes and said, “Let’s do this, I’m a personal trainer and I’m going to work you so hard.” And that she did my friends. I quickly came to find why I was the only poor soul in the class. I’m pretty sure I cried during some point of the work out as she was screaming at me to keep going… “keep going… KEEEEP GOOING”. I can still hear her years later (insert shoulder shutter).

The workout alone is enough to burn an image in my retinas, but it’s what happened next that will really live in infamy. After the traumatizing workout was through I made my way to the locker room feeling like a shaken bottle of soda. It was getting busy in there so I thought I would just change real quick and head home to shower. I took my swim suit off and wrapped myself in a towel. As I bent over to pick up my flip flops, my stomach grumbled and then it happened… I couldn’t help it, it just slipped out. A nice cheek squeak came out… yes I farted. If that wasn’t mortifying enough, as I stood up, I noticed a girl had bent down right behind me trying to tie her shoe. She was looking up at me with the most shocked and appalled look on her face. Before I knew what I was doing, I began apologizing profusely. “Oh my gosh, I’m so so sorry! I didn’t see you there!”. She is still staring at me in disbelief, mouth agape. Without missing a beat I just blurted “Damn pregnancy side effects”. Now mind you, I was not pregnant and fully didn’t understand the biological flatulence situations a pregnant woman goes through. However, by saying I was pregnant, her demeanor and attitude changed completely. “Oh honey, it’s okay! Don’t you worry yourself about this one bit!” By now the gym was hitting the busy time of the morning and I has an audience. They are all trying not to laugh at me and are looking at me in that damn “Bless your heart” way. I’m thinking to myself, geeze, pregnant ladies get great passes! Then she asks me how far along I am. Well shit, now I’m in too deep. I didn’t know what to say. I mean I’m a big girl so I just took a guess. “I think like, six months??” After having babies I realize how incredibly stupid I must have looked. Her eyebrows shot up as her eyes found their way to my flat fat belly and said questioningly “Oh well, congrats.” Yeah she figured out pretty quick I was fully of shit… well in this situation, gas! I just smiled, grabbed my clothes and went and hid the bathroom stalls, like any mature reasonable person would do. Then wait until they all laughed, I mean left.

I don’t really do the gym scene anymore. I’m pretty sure I’m an urban legend around that place. Now I like to go to group classes where there are lots of fans and loud music. So if anything slips, I’m covered. Moral of the story is… well I really don’t have one, but if this happens to you, be assured that you are not alone my friend.

Mombie

I loved watching horror movies growing up. It could be that I’ve lived in a haunted house (another story for another time) and the unknown just fascinates me. Every Halloween I’d treat myself to a new horror movie to add to my collection. However, as I’ve gotten older and have had kids, I just can’t handle them like I used too. Now if I do watch them, it has to be at 10 a.m. on a Saturday. Which is a feet in itself to watch anything other than PJ Masks anymore. There is something about getting up in the middle of the night and walking around in the dark, feeling your way around towards someone who is screaming, that can be a bit unsettling. Or when you’re greeted by a tiny shadow bobbing down the dark hallway and it takes everything in you not to kick and scream “away tiny demon!”. Forget the images of a monster under your bed kids. If you want to see something equally if not more frightening, just turn the lights on as your mother is finding her way to you in the dark. Her hair going every which way like Medusa, wild crazy eyes (because you’ve woken her up, yet again), breath that would turn on Shrek, possibly a drool stain from the corner of her mouth, pillow case creases on her forehead and her robe dragging behind her because she was to damn tired to put both arms in. I’d take my chance with the monster under the bed. So I’ve had one of those weeks where I haven’t had a full nights sleep since… okay let me think… maybe it was the summer of 2014, come to think of it. Anyway rough week, but we must carry on! The food scene was becoming dire in our house so I had to make a quick trip to Walmart. My husband and I divided the kids and conquered the store as quickly as possible w/o any break downs. When we got to the check out line I stayed and he took the kids out to the car. I had a young boy, probably high school age checking me out. I said hello and started emptying my cart. He responded with hello and then began telling me how much he weighed. “I weighed 203 and now I weigh 198. I lost 5 pounds in one day.” he began. I was like oh so are we sharing random facts today. Suppressing my sarcastic comments I congratulated him on his success. He went on to tell me he decided that he is going to lose a pound a day for the next month, as mater of fact as telling me my shoe was untied. Again trying to be nice I said I hope you do. Then he dives in telling me about portion control and drinking water. I couldn’t respond anymore. Just scan my damn Eggo waffles and be done with this! I could tell he could sense my please shut the hell up vibes, which was nice that he could pick up on some social ques. So then he tells me how tired he is….. and that it was just awful that he had to wake up at 6:45 a.m.. If I could sleep that late, I would throw a party. Well a party if everyone would leave by 9 and clean up after themselves. I couldn’t help myself, “Are you really complaining to me about being tired?”. He just looked at me. “Did you see all the kids I just had in here? I haven’t slept in years. And you know what kids do to your body? They stretch it out and fat goes into new places you didn’t even know existed.” The poor kids eyes were wide and he just awkwardly stared at me. Then a thought occurred to me. Maybe moms aren’t just scary to encounter when they are sleep deprived in dark hallways. They are scary out in the wild as well. As I loaded up my cart and walked away. I was pleased to know I hadn’t scarred the poor kid for life. As the next customer said hello, he told her how much he weighed…

The Cutest Moocher

Going out to eat with your littles is always an adventure. My husband and I are big foodies. We used to love to go out to eat, try new places and new cuisines. Now going out to eat usually involves my husband whisper shouting empty threats, spilled drinks, the kids hanging over the back of the booth trying to spark conversations with the unfortunate soul trying to eat their meal in peace and me crawling under the table to find the damn binky and picking up the enormous pile of food that our kids have left behind. Half of which I’m pretty sure isn’t all ours, but I don’t want to be “those people” so I clean. After swearing off never going out again, we do and it’s the same madness. However, it gets a little easier as they get older. So there is light at the end of the curry, I mean tunnel. Ohh curry sounds delicious. With school starting tomorrow I told O (4) that we could celebrate by going out to eat. I made the mistake of asking her where she wanted to go, because it’s always one of two place Chick-Fila or McDonald’s. I’ve got to give it to her, they have the best play areas. I’m sorry I mean Old McDonald’s according to O. Today we headed to Chick-Fila to meet up with some good friends for lunch. As I was waiting in line to order, I noticed a homeless man sitting alone at a table trying to sleep. Which is a hard thing to do when there are a million screaming hangry kids running around. Mine included. I was thinking to myself I should get him a meal or maybe a gift card, so he could use it whenever. Then I see my friend laughing, I mean really laughing. So of course I had to lean out of line to see what she is laughing at and I see my middle child M (2) sitting with a random family, eating and talking away like they were life long friends that just so happen to run into each other. I jump out of line, run over and scoop her up. I’m apologizing profusely, as I’m prying a french fry out of her tiny yet extremely strong hand. Then I find myself trying to hand back the freshly chewed fry. Gross. Luckily they were extremely gracious and thought this was hilarious and kept telling me how cute she is. Cute yes, but I apparently need to work with her on social boundaries a little more. I was still mortified and swore to them I do really feed her once in a while. I think they believed me, however they made me keep the fry. Luckily our food showed up shortly after this whole ordeal and M was satisfied. Then I remember the poor homeless man I was going to feed and he was gone. Guess it was a sign that I needed to focus on feeding my own kids so they don’t have to beg for food in restaurants.

That Was a Close One

Christmas is over and it’s a start to the new year. This past weekend was beautiful and we took down the last of our outside Christmas decorations. I mean it’s 353 days until Christmas people. Talk about putting your stuff out early! My husband and I really get into decorating. By our front door we have a 3 foot Santa and Nutcracker. My kids love them. Probably because they are about the same height. My two year old usually greets them with a hug and kiss. My four year old on the other hand was a little bit more skeptical about them. I may have told her that the elf on the shelf needed some back up to keep an eye on things. Don’t even get me started on the elf on the shelf bit. First off she wasn’t buying it and second my husband and I were the worst at remembering to move the damn thing. As I was packing things up in the kitchen I see O (the 4-year-old) loitering in the hallway next to the giant Santa. Me: “O, Whatcha doin? Need anything?” O: “Nope I’m good mama.” I walk away pretending I’m not paying attention One of my mommy super powers and defense mechanisms. Out of the corner of my eye I see her get real close to Santa’s face. O: “Hey, can you still hear me? Listen, I know you’ve been watching me and I know I haven’t been that good so I wanted to say thank you for telling him I was!” She then wraps her arms around him and gives him a quick hug and bolts off. Insert face palm. Well at least she believed that we have more spies around the house. I love making the holidays special for my children. Especially the part where i basically tell them inanimate objects are possessed and watching their every move reporting their behavior back to another mythical being. These are the traditions that bring us close together.