Girls Trip 2016

March 17, 2016 / Wanda / 14 Comments

Hello, world!

It’s been awhile. I’ve been absent from my blog for almost two months now, in part because life is so busy and requires my complete and total attention, and also because for a while there I just didn’t have anything interesting to share with you.

However, I’ve recently returned from my annual high school girls trip and that is definitely worth sharing! Every year in the spring I go on a girls only trip with three of my great friends from high school. Last year we went to Charleston, SC. This year, my girls came here to Los Angeles.

LA is a big city, and for most of the vacay we wanted the feel of paradise. Originally, we had planned to go to Catalina Island, but El Nino is an asshole and we couldn’t predict whether or not the weather would hold up for us. So we opted to stay at a resort in Palos Verdes called Terranea. It’s one of the most beautiful properties I’ve ever seen, and spending four days there was absolute heaven. We hiked the trails around the cliffs of the resort, took a whale watching tour out on the ocean, laid by the pool and drank fun cocktails in the sun overlooking the Pacific. We laughed, cackled at each other, talked and caught up on everything that’s happened over the past year. Yeah, we know how to girls trip!

The view from our room!

From the pool, looking out over the Pacific ocean.

A Sea Cave!

Hiking trails

Whale watching!

Sea Lions!

There were, shall we say, moments that weren’t so perfect. But my annual girls trip wouldn’t be what it is without some mayhem and madness along the way. As usual, each of my friends has elected to use the name of their alter ego to protect their privacy and what’s left of their reputations. We come from a small town, so….you know.

The first night at the resort was the most intense. And by intense I mean absolutely, fucking, bat-shit crazy. Belinda lives a very responsible life of dedication to her family and her community. So during girls trip she likes to let go. With us, it’s a safe zone. Jasmine is slightly more tame than Belinda, but only just. Piper is far more restrained and likes to relax and rest during girls trip. I’m somewhere in the middle. I enjoy going out and having fun but I don’t want to feel like death for three days, so I try to balance my alcohol intake and late nights in a way that allows me to enjoy the entire weekend.

After an afternoon of drinking by the pool, and then drinking at dinner, Piper went to bed to read her book while Belinda, Jasmine and I went down to the lobby bar for some live music and more drinks. I was tired, so I knew I wouldn’t stay out long but wanted to experience the hotel and I love live music. After one drink in the lobby I went back up to the room, leaving Jasmine and Belinda behind to no doubt wreak havoc on the other guests and each other. (I later heard some stories about a male, Armenian ballet dancer???)

An hour and a half later, the girls staggered into the room. I have no idea what Jasmine promised Belinda to get her to go upstairs, but I have no doubt bribery was involved. When intoxicated, it takes an act of God to get Belinda to leave a party. Regardless, they had the brilliant idea to turn our spa-style bathtub into a “hot tub.” Piper was sound asleep. I wasn’t. I laid there listening to them filling the tub with scalding hot water, sloshing water all over our luxury hotel bathroom. The conversation was as you’d expect. Drunk, nonsensical hilarity. They didn’t have a candle for the ambience so they put Vick’s Vapor Rub in the “hot tub” water to make it smell like a spa. And do you know what happens when you’re drunk and you get into really hot water, which then thins your blood even more? That’s right, it heightens the sensation of being drunk, makes you dizzy and disoriented. And do you know what happens when you’re drunk and become disoriented?

I heard Belinda say, “I’m not feeling so well.” Annnnnd, here it comes. I was actually glad she got sick. That way she could expel all the alcohol from her stomach and she could just pass out and sleep it off. A little while later she stumbled to the bed and fell asleep next to me. I got up to use the restroom and spent the next twenty minutes cleaning up the bathroom. Water and vomit. Good times.

I tried to go to sleep. It wasn’t happening. I was so tired and I had Puky-McPukerson on one side of me and Snory-McSnorerson on the other side of the room. Jasmine was sick with a chest cold, wasted and passed out, snoring like a damn freight train. Somehow Piper slept through the cluster-fuck. I laid there, forever, pissed off and contemplating the purpose of this nightmare. Why was I awake and unable to fall asleep while everyone else caused havoc and then slept peacefully, unaware of how much I was hating the whole world in that moment?

Then it happened.

I heard Belinda making a weird noise next to me and realized she had begun to get sick in her sleep. I jumped up, rolled her over and ran to the bathroom to get a towel. At one point Piper woke up, saw me standing there with a towel in one hand and a pillow covered in puke in the other. Our eyes met and she registered what was happening. She smiled a smile that said, “better you than me,” and she rolled over and went back to sleep. Bitches.

I cleaned her up, made sure she was turned on her side, and tried to go to sleep. I’d like to think I was awake all night because I was meant to save Belinda from an ugly, Jimi Hendrix style death. But there was nothing I could do to stop Jasmine from snoring all night. So I laid there in my expensive, fancy hotel room. Hating the world.

I think I finally fell asleep sometime after 4am. The last time I looked at the clock it was 3:45am. Then at 6am, Jasmine gets out of bed and starts moving around the room. She slams the bathroom door, twice. She opens the heavy draped curtains and let’s a flood of light into the dark room that blinds me, even with my eyes closed. She staggers to the phone next to me and starts randomly punching numbers in the dark, trying to call for room service. Then she stage whispers as loud as she can, “I’m so sorry. Did I wake you up? I’m still drunk and I feel like shit.” Then she says to the person on the phone, “I need a spoon! Can you bring me a spoon? I need a spoon for my yogurt. Does this room have coffee in it?”

Are you kidding me?! Awake….at 6am….for a spoon.

Much later in the day I was able to laugh about it. After I had taken an afternoon nap and stopped hating everyone. Belinda felt really bad. She thanked me for taking care of her. That’s what friends are for. You should never worry about drowning in sick while in the company of life long friends. And I know that if I was at my worst they would take care of me. Probably. If they weren’t all passed out drunk. Except they wouldn’t write about it and tell my sad tale for the whole world to read, which actually makes them better friends than me.

Sorry, not sorry. 😉

Physical Therapy is Hard

January 20, 2016 / Wanda / 24 Comments

If you’ve ever done physical therapy, this won’t come as a surprise to you.

I’ve been in PT for about four weeks now trying to address the issues with my knees. It’s going well, but it’s painful. I’m working to strengthen my hips, legs and knees in order to help my knees maintain their alignment and also alleviate the pain associated with the loss of cushioning and cartilage.

My first active session with my therapist was both embarrassing and torturous.

First, she put me through a series of hip and leg exercises that were expected and not all that different from working out with my trainer. It felt like a workout, but that was good. Afterwards, she “stretched me out.” This is where it gets embarrassing.

Like this, except laying on or your back with a therapist looming over you.

Like this, except laying on your back with a therapist looming over you.

She had me lay diagonally across a therapy table, and positioned my legs so that one foot was braced on her shoulder, and the other was bent as far back as possible under the table. She leaned into me so that my knee was almost touching my shoulder, and she used her body to stretch my other leg back under the table, stretching my quad and hip flexor. Outside the context of a PT room, this would have looked like some serious girl on girl action. I was so embarrassed by the positioning, and we were not alone in the room, I had to stare at the ceiling. I could not look her in the face while we were in this ridiculous position.

Then, with my leg jacked up to my shoulder, she digs her forearm into the top of my other thigh and says, “Your hips are so tight. Your quads and hamstrings are strong, but your hips are really tight and weak.”

Gasping through the pain of her shredding my muscle with her tiny arms of steel, I said, “No way! My hips aren’t weak! My hips are bangin’!”

Just kidding. I didn’t say that, and my hips aren’t bangin’. Well, at least not in that way. My hips are awesome in a good-Midwestern-stock-breeding-hips sort of way. I actually had a doctor tell me once that I was “good Midwestern stock.” I probably should have been offended by that at the time.

Anyway, this freaky, painful stretching escapade lasted for several minutes and then she moved me into the same position with the other leg. At one point I had to put my arm over my face and turn away because I refused to allow anyone in that room to see how much pain I was in. I kept chanting to myself quietly, “Don’t cry in public, don’t cry in public. Only candy-ass, wussie girls cry in public!” The next morning as I was getting dressed, I noticed multiple bruises all over the tops of both my thighs.

I don’t know this guy. It’s a stock photo, but an accurate depiction of pervy guy.

This physical torture has continued for four long weeks. The stretching has gotten better and less painful, although there is one dude also receiving therapy who seems to enjoy watching my stretching sessions with more enthusiasm than I’m comfortable with. I’m pretty certain he’s a pervert and probably getting off on the visual. I secretly hope the therapist gives him an extra dig with her elbow when she’s manipulating his muscles.

I wish I could say that I’ve noticed a significant difference between the knee shots and therapy, but so far, it’s mostly the same. Pain, grinding, and more pain. My therapist admitted to me that some people don’t experience any pain relief from the shots. That’s disheartening considering that I only need one more shot to complete the course of my treatment.

So yeah, physical therapy is not for sissies.

I lost my sh*t over a chicken burrito.

January 1, 2016 / Wanda / 17 Comments

Have you ever had one of those moments when you’re being completely irrational, and you know you are, but you feel so angry and the anger becomes explosive and you just say and do things you know are ridiculous?

Yeah…..that.

I had been to the doctor for another shot in my knee. I’ve learned that the hours following a shot are very uncomfortable for me. I experience a significant amount of pain and soreness for about five hours afterward. For this reason, I schedule the appointments for the late afternoon, then come home and ice my knees. Prior to the appointment that day I asked Dan to handle dinner. I would be arriving home right at dinner time and I didn’t want to deal with cooking and waiting on everyone while trying to manage the pain.

If I’m being completely honest, I was a little emotional before going to the doctor. I wasn’t looking forward to it. The shots hurt. And in hindsight, I think I just wanted my family to take care of me, instead of being the one who takes care of everyone else.

So, I get home and no dinner is being prepared. Dan is sitting on the couch with the kids. I’m starving, sore and starting to get pissed. I asked him what he planned to do for dinner and he said he was going to order Mexican food.

Fine.

I get my ice pack and get settled on the couch with my knee propped up just so. Thirty minutes later, Dan is still looking online for a restaurant. He makes a comment about how he wishes I liked this one particular place that has always been his favorite. We never order from there because I don’t like their food. I said, “We can order from there. I’ll just order something I know they can’t screw up.” The last time we ordered from this place my dinner was horrible. And I should mention, that it’s almost become a joke in our family that when we order food, if any order gets screwed up, it’s almost always mine.

So I ask Dan to order me a chicken burrito, with mild green Verde sauce. Just a basic chicken burrito. He triple checked my order before he completed the online transaction. Now he’s super psyched that he gets dinner from one of his favorite places.

By the time the food arrives it’s been over two hours since I got home. I’m starving and in the throes of my knee pain. I’m really looking forward to this chicken burrito.

I hobble to the kitchen because it hurts to put full weight on my knee. I start sorting the containers and handing out food. The meal Bryce ordered is much smaller than we expected, so he finishes his dinner before I’m done handing out food. I can’t find my food. There are two wet burritos. One with a red sauce, and one with an orange sauce. Dan ordered the red sauce. We both realize that my order is wrong. Typical.

My anger starts to simmer.

I open the lid and dip a fork into the sauce to see if it’s edible. Holy shit! It’s orange fire sauce! I start choking and gagging as the liquid fire slides down my throat. I involuntarily cry out, “Motherfucker!” Even Dan, who LOVES spicy food, agreed this sauce covering the burrito was almost inedible.

Dan offered me his burrito in exchange, but I hate red sauce. It tastes like starch and yucky things. He gets online to contact the restaurant to tell them they made a mistake and get me the correct burrito.

In the meantime, Bryce is asking for more dinner. He’s still hungry and there is nothing else in the order that he can eat. He says he would like some plain pasta. I look to Dan, expecting him to make the pasta so I can go sit down with some ice, but Dan has his burrito and is on his way to the table where he casually sits down to eat. He says the restaurant is sending over a new burrito for me. And he starts eating…

My anger kicks up to another level at this point. Like, I want to start yelling, but that won’t help the situation, so I tamp it down. I’m taking deep, calming breaths.

I start hobbling around the kitchen, making another dinner for Bryce. I don’t say anything. I can’t believe he just sat down to eat his dinner and is watching me limp around the kitchen, cooking, which is exactly what I asked him to help me avoid this evening. I’m so pissed. But if I lose my shit, somehow I feel like the asshole. So I suck it up and make pasta for Bryce. I have left-over sauce in the fridge, he just needs fresh pasta. Simple enough. Except that my knee is throbbing, and I can actually feel my heartbeat in my knee.

I finish making and serving him dinner, and clean up the mess. At this point, everyone else has eaten, except me. I go sit down with my ice. Another 45 minutes later and my new burrito arrives. And guess what….

It was the same goddamned orange fire sauce burrito they sent me the first time! I waited over an hour for them to send me the same fucking inferno-burrito! It’s like this burrito was made in hell, and Satan keeps sending it forth to taunt me!

I yelled. I cursed. I slammed cabinets as I limped around the kitchen, re-heating left-overs that I could have eaten over three fucking hours ago when I got home from the doctor. All I wanted was for someone else to handle dinner so I could sit and elevate my knee and deal with the pain. I was out of my mind with anger and resentment. I sat at the counter, eating my shitty left-overs, hating all of them with the white-hot intensity of a thousand suns.

Word.

When I was done, I limped back to the couch. It was 8:30pm. I wanted to cry. I wanted to yell and throw shit. The anger was a physical pain in my chest and I had no outlet to get rid of it. I wanted just one member of my family to pay attention to me and care that I was upset. I looked at the three of them sitting on the sofas. All of them had their faces buried in their technology. All of them content, happily fed and taken care of. I flipped each one of them off. A prolonged, middle finger stuck in the air, pointed in each of their directions. I didn’t even care how inappropriate that action was. Not one of them looked up. Then I said, “Screw you guys.” No reaction. They hadn’t heard me because they were all so self-absorbed with their iPads, iPods and computers. I think I hate Apple products now.

So I left the room. Not one of them noticed that I even got up. I limped upstairs and put myself to bed. I laid there hating the whole world, lamenting the injustices of being an unappreciated wife and mother, and vowing from the depths of my soul to never wash their dirty underwear again, until I fell asleep.

A few days later we were having dinner with another couple. The husband starting telling a funny story about how he and his wife got into a ridiculously intense argument over an apple pie crust. It was in the same vein as my sad tale, so I said, “I completely understand. I lost my shit over a chicken burrito the other night.” As I was re-telling the story, Dan had no idea that I’d flipped him off and basically told him to go screw himself before leaving the room. As I retold this part of the story, he burst out laughing, grabbed me by the face and kissed me at the table in front of everyone. Then he said, “THAT’s why I love you!”

Apparently he likes his women like he likes his burritos. Fiery! 😉

This is how I know I’m getting old, Part 2

December 20, 2015 / Wanda / 13 Comments

Several months ago I wrote a post titled, This is how I know I’m getting old. I talked mostly about how my attitude and perspectives about various things have changed over the years, for better or for worse.

Well, my attitude is not the only thing that’s been changing. As my 94 year-old Nanny would say, “Getting old is not for sissies.”

Here are a few more tell-tale indicators that I am officially old.

1. When I was younger, if I had a weird pain in my abdomen I wouldn’t think twice about it and blamed it on the pizza I ate for dinner. Now, weird pains in any part of my body makes me worry about kidney stones, ulcers, cancer and any number of horrible diseases that seem to be an inevitable part of aging. I’m 41, and it’s logical to think my shit is going to start falling apart. I didn’t worry about my liver in my twenties. Now, with every cocktail, I worry that my liver is 41 years-old and may not appreciate my love of wine and margaritas. The same holds true for all my other organs. I think to myself, “Damn, my lower back hurts, I hope my kidneys aren’t about to have a mid-life crisis.”

2. I have sun spots on the back of my left hand, but not on my right hand. My left hand is my driving hand and the hand that gets the most sun exposure when I’m in the car. Now I hate myself for not putting sunscreen on that hand before driving every day for the last 25 years. No one thinks about sun spots or sun damage on their hands when they’re 25!

3. When I was eighteen, my mom warned me that as I aged the elasticity around my eyes would be one of the first things to go. Her intention was to provoke me into a routine of good skin care. Thankfully I listened to her, for the most part. But she was right. The skin on my eyelids isn’t as tight as it used to be, and I can no longer wear any type of shimmer eye-shadow because it accentuates the loose skin and makes me look like an old hooker.

4. Saggy boobs. Sigh. I won’t go into too much detail about this because, you know, TMI. But I will say two things on this subject. 1. I would kill to have my 25 year-old boobies back, and 2. Gravity combined with Age is a double whammy of a mother-fucker and I hate you both.

5. More often than I care to admit, I will walk into a room to do something and realize I’ve completely forgotten what I entered that room to do. My short-term memory is for shit at this point, and it never fails. I will walk all the way back downstairs and then remember what I walked upstairs to do. So then I have to walk back up the stairs, which is hell on my knees. And this leads me to #6…

If you’re too young to get this reference, then I feel sorry for you.

6. About two years ago, I noticed my knees were starting to hurt when I walked up stairs. Then it was my ankles. I went from being able to do jogging intervals during my workouts to low impact incline intervals because my knees and ankles couldn’t handle the impact from jogging anymore. Also, whenever I bend at the knees or ankles, twist or pivot those joints, everything goes snap, crackle and pop. The other night my knee popped so loudly it sounded like bone snapping and my husband looked at me and said, “Holy shit, was that you?” Arthritis runs heavily in my family and my mom and grandmother have both had knee replacements. After multiple workouts with my trainer that resulted in extreme pain in my knees and ankles, she insisted that I stop ignoring the problem and see an orthopedist.

About two weeks ago I had my first appointment with the orthopedist. During the appointment I was shuttled between various techs, X-ray, and the doctor’s physician’s assistant. At one point, two techs got into an argument over which one of them was to assist me to an exam room. Here’s how the conversation went:

Tech 1: I’ll be taking you to exam room 4.

Tech 2: No, she’s with me in room 6.

(I’m standing in between these two guys who are towering over me. They’re young, perhaps in their mid-twenties.)

Tech 1: Are you trying to steal my patient? She’s with me.

Tech 2: Dude, she’s with me. She want’s to be with a better looking guy anyway.

Me: Boys, settle down. This isn’t a bar and you don’t need to fight over me. And by the way, everyone here is good-looking, so that’s not a qualifier. (I live in LA. The staff in this doctor’s office all look like they stepped off the cover of some trendy health/fitness magazine. And the fact that they were arguing over me and I was annoyed by it is further proof that I’m officially old. It wasn’t flattering. I wanted to knock their heads together and tell them to grow the fuck up. See, I’m so old.)

Thankfully the physician’s assistant came to my rescue and directed me to the room she wanted me in. When my doctor walked in my jaw almost hit the floor. He did not look like a distinguished orthopedic surgeon. As my husband so aptly described it, he looked like a Swedish porn star. Tall, definitely younger than I expected, athletic, easy on the eyes. I could imagine him more clearly in a wet suit surfing on the beach or posing in a photo shoot for a men’s health magazine before I would imagine him in an operating room. (I realize this information is completely irrelevant to the topic of my post, but when your doctor looks like he could be working in a strip club, that certainly adds an element of holy-crap-I-have-veiny-legs-and-I-have-to-let-hot-doctor-touch-them stress to the situation. Hot doctors are not a good thing, and they add to the discomfort of the situation. I already feel old. Now I feel old and self-conscious about whether or not I shaved my legs good enough that day. The struggle is real, folks.)

It’s an angry needle.

He sent me to get an MRI and the results showed that I’ve lost most of the cartilage around my patella/knee caps. I also have the beginning stages of arthritis in my knees. The treatment at this point is a series of shots in my knees to replace my joint fluid and lubrication, along with physical therapy. I almost lost my shit when he asked if I was ready for my first shot. I’m not thrilled about letting anyone stab me in the knees with a four-inch needle! So, I said, “No, thank you.” He said, “PT is going to hurt like hell if we don’t do this, and it will help alleviate the pain and inflammation in your knees.”

Rock, meet hard place.

So I sucked it up and got the first of six shots. If you’ve never had a shot in your knee, let me say this….it was unpleasant, but it certainly wasn’t the worst thing I’ve endured. It was fast and I didn’t scream or curse out loud. That’s good for me considering I dropped a ‘mother-fucker’ during my mammogram. But I had to grit my teeth and my back involuntarily arched off the table in physical response to the sensation. For me, dental shots are worse. An epidural is worse. Mammograms are most definitely worse. And considering I need three shots in each knee to complete the treatment, that’s a good thing. My knee was sore for the rest of the night and I rewarded myself for my bravery (yes, I’m calling it that) by having wine and sushi for dinner. It was a treat, and my old, broken-ass deserved it.

In summary…my Nanny was right, getting old is definitely not for sissies.

Kill Shot! (A Ladies Night Out)

December 10, 2015December 10, 2015 / Wanda / 9 Comments

This past year I was invited to join a charity based women’s group. Once a month a member of the group is responsible for organizing a fun, something-out-of-the-ordinary group event. That member also picks a charity/fundraiser for the group to support each month. We learn something new and also do a community service at the same time. It’s a win-win.

For the month of November, the group event was a beginner’s gun safety class that included time in the firing range with instructors, learning how to use several different types of hand guns. Considering the recent world events, hot-button topics around gun control and politics, this seemed like a very timely activity.

I grew up in rural Michigan, for the most part, and firearms are common in many households. Most of my male friends and family members from back home are hunters and I was not raised to fear guns. Respect them, yes, but fear them…no. Despite growing up around guns, I myself never actually fired one before. I had no interest in learning how to shoot as a teenager. I was more interested in scoring NKOTB tickets and curling my hair. And I just took it for granted that if shit went down, someone around me would know how to handle the situation.

Now, as an adult living with my family is southern California, my perspective has changed somewhat. I do not own a gun, nor have I ever owned a gun. Neither has my husband. But it’s something we’ve been talking about. The world is changing, and Dan and I both agree that we can’t afford to be ignorant about what it might take to protect our home and family. Every day I turn on the news and listen to stories about home invasions, burglaries, sexual assaults and murder in the LA area. Granted, LA is a very large, densely populated city, which could explain the seemingly high crime rate, but violent crime is a regular occurrence here, nonetheless. Although my neighborhood and community is typically very safe and family friendly, that can’t be my excuse for being uneducated and unprepared in a time of crisis. So when the opportunity to participate in this gun class came up, I jumped at it. The group also agreed to allow our husbands to participate in this event, so Dan and one other husband joined us for the class.

I will admit that when I first heard the group was organizing this event I got super excited. I thought it would be so badass! I hoped I would be good at it! Don’t most of us secretly imagine ourselves as some supreme badass super-hero at some point? Even if it’s completely unrealistic? Have you ever imagined yourself as the hero or heroine in your favorite action movie or book? Well, I have, and all my favorite heroines know how to kick-ass and take names. I admire men and women who know how to handle themselves, intellectually as well as physically, and I will be honest and say that I was looking for a little validation that there might be some steel beneath the magnolia. Plus, no one wants to look like a candy-ass at a firing range!

True story.

But surprisingly, excitement is not what I felt during the class. The class was taught by the manager of the firing range and it was very informative and safety oriented. It was also very sobering. To hold that cold, hard steel in my hands and know that it’s an instrument to both protect myself but also hurt another person left me feeling very heavy. I could feel the weight of that responsibility across my entire body, not just in my hands. And this was just while I was practicing how to load a semi-automatic hand gun with fake bullets. It was a bit terrifying to realize that once I got into that range, if I screwed up, someone could get hurt.

When the time came to move into the firing range, I was so nervous. Even with head-gear on, it was incredibly loud and the smell of gun powder was thick in the air. I became very uncomfortable with the idea of shooting in mixed company. I didn’t know any of these other people sharing the range with our group. What if one of them lost their shit, turned around and just open fired? There was one squirrelly little man who made most of us nervous. He was using a wicked looking rifle with high-caliber ammunition. He kept hopping around with this delighted smile on his face while squeezing off rapid fire shots at his target. Even the staff at the range had to keep asking him to slow his roll. A staff member would come over the speaker system and say, “Hey Rambo, settle down in there. No more than one round per second.” Really? Because that’s a lot of fucking rounds!!!

As for our group, we had three bays with two handguns situated at each bay. We also had two instructors assisting us and providing verbal directions. The first gun I used was a Beretta, and the first shot I fired was not at all what I expected. It wasn’t sexy. It wasn’t exciting. It was stressful. It was much harder than I thought it would be, and it took a great deal of physical and mental concentration. While the kick-back wasn’t too bad, I found my entire body tensing with each shot. I had to take deep breaths to calm myself in order to line up my shot accurately and the shells kept flying back and bouncing off the side of my head and shoulder. After loading my second weapon, my shoulders and arms began to ache from the strain. At the second bay, I used a Glock 17 for my target practice and I found it to be more comfortable than the Beretta. My aim improved significantly, and one of the instructors kept narrating the anatomical injuries of the target with each shot I took. This definitely added some levity to the moment and helped me to relax. The more I relaxed, the better I did.

My target practice

“Oh, bulls eye! That’s a kill shot baby!”

“Left lung! He’s a goner!”

“You got him in the throat! That’ll do it!”

When I was done he said, “Everyone one of those is a kill shot, honey. You did good.”

Although there were six different hand guns for us to try, I found I had hit my physical limit after three. So much for my secret super-hero status! I do regret not taking my turn with the 357 Revolver, as everyone else said this one was much easier to use. Overall, the night turned out well and we had a great time, but I find myself to be completely conflicted over it. I wanted to do well, and I did. I wanted to like it, and I didn’t. I’ve been trying to tell myself that’s a good thing.

The San Bernardino shooting took place two days after my gun class, and two hours away from where I live. The world is changing. And realizing how much we might have to change with it breaks my heart a little more each day.

PS–this is not meant to be a political post of any kind. I am not advocating for or against gun control. I’m simply sharing my experience with you. And because I hate ending this post on such a somber note, I’ll leave you with this….

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The Talk

November 10, 2015November 10, 2015 / Wanda / 20 Comments

You know the one I’m referring to, right?

Of course, I’m talking about The Sex Talk. I should clarify and say that I didn’t intend to have the sex talk yet, but when you’re looking for shortcuts in dealing with major transitional issues in your child’s life, well, shit happens.

My daughter is eleven years old now, and in middle school. I remember middle school well. It’s an excruciating time period rife with insecurity, bad skin, growth spurts, and hormonal rebellion. And with the hormones come the puberty, and with the puberty comes the realization that boys aren’t gross (all the time). Sometimes, they’re cute. And funny. And did I mention cute?

Bryn started coming home from school with stories about eighth graders holding hands or kissing in the hallways. She says it’s gross, but I can tell she has that beginning fascination with watching it unfold, and trying to figure out how a seemingly normal girl/classmate would want to kiss a boy in the hallway at school. She wants to understand it. And I want her to understand it. As much as I hate it, I don’t want her to be ignorant about what’s happening around her. In a world where kids are growing up too fast and have too much access to adult content, I don’t want her to be uninformed about her body or how it’s changing. I want her to understand why eighth graders believe they’re mature enough to be “in love,” and why they think it’s a grand idea to shove their tongues down each other’s throats in the middle of a junior high hallway with an audience. I want her to be as informed as possible so that as she gets older she can make informed decisions for herself without relying on misguided and/or incorrect information from her friends. Plus, if she’s ignorant about things she’s more apt to succumb to peer pressure, and we all know peer pressure is an asshole!

I just wasn’t ready to approach all of that at once. I thought I would spread it out a little.

To help guide me in this new world of raising a pre-teenage girl, I did the only thing that made sense. I bought a book. Books are awesome. I was at a book party with several moms from my neighborhood and the book I purchased came highly recommended by the woman selling the books. I also noticed several other moms purchasing the book so I snatched up my copy, flipped through it and decided the content was appropriate for Bryn’s age and developmental level. Puberty, periods, and pimples. Perfect.

My original intention was to sit down with Bryn and for us to read the book together. But after three weeks of the book lying on my dresser untouched because I didn’t make the time to read it with her, I just gave it to her and said, “Here, read this and let me know if you have any questions.”

Famous last words.

She did read it, and holy hell did she have questions! I should have read the book first. Then I could have tagged the pages I wanted her to read and saved the rest for later. But I didn’t do that. And I paid the price.

Bryn came downstairs after about an hour of reading and said, “Mom, what does this mean when they say a slippery fluid comes out of the woman’s vagina when she’s going to have sex? And I’m unclear about this whole erection thing.”

I grabbed the book and read the page she was referring to. It was a very detailed explanation of the mechanics of sex. It was worded appropriately considering the book is an educational tool, however, it was more detail than I had planned to share at this point, and clearly further explanation on my part was necessary. I had no choice. Pandora’s Box had been opened and it was all my fault. I couldn’t ask her to un-read what she had read. The knowledge was there and now needed my parental clarification.

I grabbed a glass (read bottle) of wine to fortify myself and we went upstairs to her room to continue the conversation I had never intended to start. The book covered everything from sex, puberty, periods, hygiene, acne, male genitalia, masturbation, wet dreams for males, attraction to both the opposite sex and same sex genders, as well as nutrition, exercise, and the dangers of drugs and alcohol. Holy sweet Jesus!

Two hours later she looked at me and said, “And you do this? You do the sex with daddy?”

To hesitate is to show fear. I couldn’t hesitate. I looked her in the eyes, fought to keep a straight face and said, “Yes, I do.” She looked back at me for a long moment, and then she calmly said, “That’s just gross.”

She then went on to explain that I didn’t need to worry about her having sex because she was not interested in doing that, ever. I asked if she’d be willing to sign a contract in blood every year until she graduated from high school. She was confused by my request, so I let that one drop.

At the end of the day I was glad we talked about it. But her new found knowledge has opened up new and not always welcome conversations. The other night we were watching TV and there was a commercial on for erectile dysfunction medication. Now that she knows the vocabulary, I can’t take anything for granted. She said, “What did the commercial mean when they said ‘Be sure your heart is healthy enough for sex.'” So I told her, “You know how exercise increases your heart rate? Well, sex is like exercise, and the old guys can’t always handle it if they have a bad heart.” 😉

PS–I’ll leave you with my favorite passage from her book. This was a girl’s book, by the way, so I’m not entirely sure why this information was necessary considering they have a separate book available for boys. I did find it rather hilarious though.

“Boys often have erections at inconvenient moments and it can be especially awkward if the erection won’t go down. While a boy is asleep, he may have what’s called a wet dream–an erection and then an orgasm….This is only his body getting used to its new way of working, but it can be embarrassing to stain the sheets.” —What’s Happening to Me?

One month

November 4, 2015 / Wanda / 11 Comments

That’s how long its been since I posted to my blog.

Holy shit. Time flies.

Part of me feels like I need to apologize for such a long absence, but the other part of me realizes that my life demands that I be present and in the moment. My family and my other responsibilities don’t always accommodate the time I need to put together a decent blog post. We’re all busy and we all prioritize differently. So instead of apologies, I’ll just say, HELLO WORLD! I’ve missed you!

The past month has been a whirlwind of activity. I’ve resumed my volunteer work as the garden docent for my son’s Kindergarten class. I was also suckered into being the room mom for his class as well, so now between the school garden and working in the classroom to help his teacher, it’s like I have an almost full time job. The upside is that now I’m openly revered by twenty one small people who look at me with undeserved wonder and admiration, thrilled that I know all their names and tell them how great they are at drawing stick people and gluing pasta to construction paper. It’s a tough job, but someone has to do it.

A few weeks ago, Dan and I snuck off to Chicago one more time for one last wedding among my college friends. It was beautiful and amazing. The weather was perfect for fall and the trees were just starting to change colors. The bride was stunning and we were all a bit better behaved than at the last wedding. I’d like to write a full post about it but I fear that I’d really just be repeating myself from the previous wedding post. We drink a lot, we’re super badass, we love each other, we’re friends for life. You know the drill.

And of course, there was Halloween! Halloween is a big deal at our house. We love it! This year was especially awesome because the day fell on a Saturday, so instead of the usual week night rush to get dinner done, kids jammed into their costumes and start handing out candy to the toddlers who start trick or treating before dark, we had the time to really set up and participate in the evening. My husband decorated the driveway with strobe lights, a smoke machine, black lights, and glow in the dark cobwebs all over the garage door. What was super badass was my costume. I was

Yup, I looked just like her. LOL!

Maleficent. When the kids rounded the corner of my driveway the first thing they saw was Maleficent standing in front of a strobe light surrounded by billowing smoke and eerie glowing cobwebs. It was so fun! The kids loved it and so did the adults. Some of them asked to take their picture with Maleficent, which was a little weird for me but still fun. We also driveway party with our neighbors on Halloween, so when the kids are done trolling the neighborhood, we all hang out in the driveway and drink wine. At around 10pm a neighbor we hadn’t met came over to introduce herself. She said she just had to come check us out because our driveway was the talk of the neighborhood the whole night. Seriously! I told my husband, “Did you hear that? We’ve got a rep. We’re the cool kids now.” LOL!

Anyway, it’s been a busy and fun month. With Thanksgiving coming I know things won’t be slowing down any time soon. I look forward to catching up on all my favorite blogs and hopefully I’ll throw together some fun stories myself to share with all of you. It’s not like I don’t have a ton of material. Teaching gardening to a bunch of five year olds? There’s a mountain of hilarity in there somewhere. 😉

Labor Day weekend, a wedding and a lot of wine!

September 15, 2015January 11, 2026 / Wanda / 9 Comments

Labor Day weekend Dan and I went to Chicago without the kids for a wedding. One of my college roommates was getting married and we haven’t had a grown-up only weekend in almost a year. It was fantastic!

When I travel without my kids everything is different. I can drink wine on the plane, only pack for myself, and read smutty chic-lit on my Kindle instead of entertaining two kids for four hours with snacks, Ipad games and constant reminders to stop kicking the seat in front of them. I relaxed, enjoyed the flight into my favorite city, and did my best to get over the fact that I had to sit in the suck-hump-middle seat in order to sit next to my husband on the flight. No one likes the middle seat, on any airplane, ever.

Chicago was amazing, as always, and the wedding was so fun. I’ve been blessed in my life with the gift of incredible, life long friendships, and my college friends are some of the most outrageous, hilarious, intelligent, dynamic, beautiful women I know. We’ve all gone on to do different things with our careers and family, but when we come together it’s like no time has passed and we’re all nineteen again with fake ID’s trying to sneak into bars and pick up hot guys, except now those hot guys are our husbands.

Here’s the recap, and nicknames have been given to protect the guilty.

On the way to the wedding, TSGHLM’s (This Summer’s Gonna Hurt Like A Motherfucker-her requested nickname) dress split up the side. Dr. Evil and I took turns sewing her back into her dress on the Uber ride into downtown Chicago. Unfortunately, Dr. Evil gets car sick, and trying to sew TSGHLM’s dress caused her to become extremely nauseated. She managed to hold it together, I took over the sewing, and no pre-wedding car sickness occurred. TSGHLM’s dress was repaired and I can now add car seamstress to my list of party tricks.

During dinner Dr. Evil kept trying to build a glass pyramid on the table with all the empty wine and champagne glasses. The wait staff would calmly walk over and dismantle her pyramid without too much fuss and take the empty glasses. She would wait until they walked away and we would drain our glasses so she could re-build her crystal masterpiece. We had a lot of glasses. When they finally reprimanded her for her inappropriate behavior, she responded by adding another tier to her tower.

Also, at some later point during dinner, someone who’s judgment was definitely questionable decided that the party favors on the table, which looked to me like crystal candle holders embossed with the bride and groom’s name and wedding date, were actually small wine glasses. So they became wine glasses, and I’m still unclear on their actual function.

During the reception, Trixie decided to re-create the Patrick Swayze/Jennifer Grey scene in Dirty Dancing by crawling across the dance floor, on her hands and knees, in her evening dress, toward another of our friends sitting at a table. She completed the crawl but might have been too drunk to get back up. I was laughing so hard I missed part of it, but I’m pretty sure she had to call for an assist.

During an epic dance performance, I may or may not have allowed Dr. Evil to motor-boat my chest on the dance floor. I’m super classy like that, and you may be realizing why we call her Dr. Evil.

The Bride, whom we shall call Ellie, got busted in the bathroom for smoking an e-cigarette. The event staff had to reprimand her, at her own wedding! She also had her sister cut the tulle out from under her dress during the reception. Nothing says good times like vandalizing your own wedding gown on your big day!

There was a really beautiful moment when the DJ played Time After Time by Cyndi Lauper. Our small, drunk army of roommates and friends gathered around Ellie and circled her on the dance floor. We danced around her, singing at the top of our lungs while each of us took turns dancing with her in the center of our circle. It was a complete and total love fest as well as a gesture of loyalty and solidarity that has remained unchanged for the past 23 years.

I’m pleased to report that there were no public displays of nudity or pressed ham. And believe me when I say that’s progress, folks. At this point in my life, with this group of friends, I could never run for public office. There is way too much photographic evidence of the good times we’ve had in life. Dan showed me cell phone video of me rocking out with the ladies like a wannabe 80’s rock goddess on the dance floor, and I said, “Oh, that’s the wine talking. That’s ugly dancing! Delete that and we shall never speak of it.”

I woke up the next afternoon feeling like road kill. We spent the day like we would’ve in college. We laid on the couch, watched movies, ate good food and made fun of each other and our epically bad behavior. We’re forty! It’s like all maturity goes out the window when we’re together. We egg each other on and enable each other for the sake of entertainment and bragging rights. When I expressed this to Dan his most wonderful and appreciated response was, “I love your friends.”

Yeah, I love them too.

My 1980 Fan Girl Celebrity Crush!

August 24, 2015 / Wanda / 14 Comments

Hello, world!

I’ve been absent from the internet for a bit as too many other obligations and activities have been claiming my attention. After this week I should have plenty of time to catch up on my reading, and I’m dying to see what’s been going on with all of you. 🙂

This past weekend was packed with so much grown-up fun, I barely survived it. My husband has an incredible group of friends/fraternity brothers from college and this past weekend we celebrated two big events… one birthday and one wedding. I was fortunate to get a babysitter for both occasions, so Dan and I got dressed up and partied like rock stars. Sadly, it’s Monday and I’m still feeling the effects of the late nights and excessive cocktails. Getting older is such hell.

For real.

Anyway, the fun part of this story (at least for me) took place at the wedding. The bride and groom rented out a boutique hotel in the heart of Manhattan Beach for the event and it was one of the most beautiful weddings I’ve ever attended. Now, I’m not a person who gets star-struck. Living in LA, that’s just part of the culture and environment, and thankfully, I could give two-shits about most celebrities. They’re just people. Nothing to get excited about. Except……when one of my childhood crushes walks into the room.

Hart to Hart: Stefanie Powers and Robert Wagner
Image Source: Sony Pictures Home Entertainment

As a kid I was in love with Peirce Brosnan from Remington Steele. Eric Estrada from Chips. Henry Winkler as The Fonz. Tom Sellack as Magnum P.I. And…..Robert Wagner from Hart to Hart. So, you can imagine my fan girl reaction when Robert Wagner and his gorgeous wife, Jill St. John walked into the wedding!!!!!!!! A freaking Bond Girl walked into the wedding!!!!!!!!!!! She starred in Diamonds are Forever (1971) with freaking Sean Connery! AAAAAGGGGGHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!! (By the way, Sean Connery was in my top ten until he turned 80, but I still love him!)

He is dashing!

So, I handled myself with all the dignity of a twelve year old at a One Direction concert. I approached the groom (Dan’s dear friend and fraternity brother) and calmly told him that I would grant whatever favor he wanted if he could introduce me to Mr. Wagner and his wife without making me look like a complete asshole. It turns out that the groom’s mother is a cousin of Jill St. John, and the groom arranged a most natural introduction by first introducing me to his mother who was seated next to Jill and Robert. She then casually introduced me to her guests. Then…..I ruined it by telling Mr. Wagner that I’ve had a crush on him since 1980 and that I basically begged to be introduced to him. Sigh. I know, I am such an asshole.

Jill St. John! She was absolutely lovely and still a very beautiful woman!

Thankfully, Mr. Wagner and his wife were gracious and friendly. They exude that old Hollywood charm that is missing from so many of their younger peers today. I interrupted their dinner, but they stopped eating to shake hands, exchange small talk and allowed me to take a picture with them. Robert, or RJ as he asked me to call him, even made my husband take extra pictures to ensure they turned out. He also thanked me for the nice compliment about having a crush on him for three and a half decades. LOL! I have several pictures, and unfortunately I can’t post any of them. I have a strict policy of not posting pictures of other people on the internet without their permission. I was not the only person in the photos, so I will respect the privacy of the other people involved.

So, as I continue to recover from the weekend and Google past Hart to Hart episodes on the internet, I would love to know if you have any ‘fan girl’ moments of your own. 😉

Birthday Gifts

August 7, 2015 / Wanda / 5 Comments

A conversation with my son, Bryce. He will be turning five in a few weeks.

Me:   What do you want for your birthday?
Bryce:   A Dj set! (He then starts to imitate scratching records with motion and sound.)
Me:   So you can drop a fresh beat?
Bryce: Yes!
Me:   Where did you learn about DJ turntables and scratching records?
Bryce:   America’s Cutest Cats!

Happy Friday everyone!