Looky-Loos and Dirty Gawkers

I have a cute kid. Actually, she's not just cute; she's downright adorable. It's a scientific fact that has been proven. Seriously. And, as anyone with a cute kid knows, people love to look at your kid. Sometimes though it's not just a 'Aww, isn't she sweet' look, it's a strange look. What I would would characterize as a 'gawk'. Maybe it's just me (and it probably is), but these 'gawks' seem to outnumber the nice, polite glances sometimes.
I do realize that I may look a little strange to some people around here. You would think that living near a college town people would have seen folks alot stranger looking than a 26 year old girl with short hair and moderately large plugs in her ears. Maybe they're not allowed out that often. Maybe there are more important things for them to watch on Fox news, who knows. Whatever the reason, when I catch these 'gawkers' I can see their wheels turning. I know they're thinking a myriad of things like:

"What is that 12 year old boy doing with that baby?"
"What is that lesbian doing with a kid? I didn't think they could reproduce..."
"Look at that hippie freak-o with that baby strapped to her. I bet she's a dirty commie..."
I love it when when I catch these people staring. Actually, I hate it. Nothing makes me more angry than these people in their minivans sitting there judging me while I struggle to cram a kicking and screaming child in a Ford Focus. I need a new approach. I need to look at them right in the eye and smile. It'll creep them out so much. I'll feed on their fear much like sharks, bears, rabid dogs and small children.

But, worse than the 'gawkers' are the scourge I call the 'looky-loos'. The 'looky-loos' are usually people over 45 who have either grown children or grandchildren and find it perfectly normal to go out of their way to come over touch your child while giving you unsolicited parenting advice. Target, restaurants, the grocery store, no place is off limits to these people. They will hunt you down on the bread aisle to touch your kid with their (probably) unwashed hands and say things like:
"Look at that red hair! Boy, you don't look like your parents do you..."
"What a cute little boy! Oh, she's a girl? Well..."
"She can't be an only child! Oh, no matter what you say now, you will have more..."
"Is she walking yet? You know my kids walked at 8 months..."
"Can she talk yet? Well, my kids could recite the Gettysburg address at 10 months..."
My kid is never dirty, hungry, unloved, or inappropriately dressed, but according to these people, I am absolutely failing as a parent and as a human being and it's their responsibility to passive-aggressively tell me. Thanks Grandma for the pep talk. I think I'll call DCS immediately and relinquish all my parental rights.
Thank God there are people out there like this; otherwise, I might think I'm a decent mom to this kid.

Automobile Gynocologist

I was only supposed to hold the light.
That's it. Just a light. But what started as me 'helping' ended up as me 'doing it all'. But, I'm getting ahead of myself. Let's start at the beginning...
Bubba decided it would be a great idea to do some of our own minor car repairs. Now, to be fair, I completely supported this idea because, at the time, it did not include me doing anything at all. I was fine with him doing whatever he wanted to with the car as long as I wasn't around to screw anything up. I won't be held responsible for putting myself and/or The Kid in danger. Oh no, I need someone else to blame that on.
"I'm gonna go out and put this belt on while y'all get a bath ok?" Bubba yelled to me. I was sitting on top of the toilet in the hall bathroom watching The Kid play in the tub. "Sure" I reply. I should have jumped in the bathtub with The Kid right then, but I continued to sit there and read a magazine while the dog joined The Kid in her quest to drink every bit of the soapy water in the tub. Ten minutes later Bubba appears in the doorway. "Umm, hey. Can you come out here and help me? I need you to hold the light." "Ok. Let me get her out of the bath and put some clothes on her". With the baby dressed and put in her baby prison -er, I mean 'pack and play'- I threw on a sweatshirt and went out to the garage. Bubba's standing there with mechanic gloves on looking at me. "Can you hold the light right here? I can't see what I'm doing." I hold the light while he tries to mess with the serpentine belt. After about ten minutes of grunting, cursing and pulling he stops what he's doing. "Your hands are small. Do you think you could maybe get the belt just around this back part? My arms are too big to fit." What? No. He lured me out there under false pretenses. I was only supposed to hold a light! This isn't 'can you change these wiper blades?' or 'will you fill up the wiper fluid?', no, this is 'can you put this rubber strap over and under about 10 different wheels that make the car run?'. Crap. All I need to do screw up something and not only am I in trouble for breaking Bubba's car, but I will have broken the nice car. Oh well. It was his idea. I put on Bubba's XL mechanic gloves and put my hands down the side of the engine. "You feel that?" he says "Now, you're going to need to put the belt around that wheel and bring it back over the smooth one and around the smaller one with the grooves" he says. "What?! What the hell are you talking about?" "It's on the diagram I found on the Internet." he replies and points to the computer. Sure. You can also find a diagram on how to perform open heart surgery on the Internet, but that doesn't mean you should try it with out a medical degree. But, I'm either a good sport or a glutton for punishment so I look at the picture. It doesn't look that hard. If I can knit and braid hair, surely I can do this. Right? Well, it's too late to back out, so I dug in.
Fast forward about 20 minutes and a lot of wiggling and cursing, I'm laying on top of the engine shoulder deep in a Carolla. I swore that if I ever, ever get ahold of whatever moron... hold on. If I just moved a little to the left...there! "Hurry! Pull the tension!" I yelled. And just like that, I did it. I freaking did it. Me. After almost an hour violating that poor little foreign car I became the most bad-ass person on my block.

Codewords

Valentine's Day. The one day of the year where a grown man can buy a woman roses, chocolates, underwear, and a giant stuffed animal without getting a restraining order in return. Speaking of Valentine's, did you know that St. Valentine was not actually one person, but the name given to several martyred saints of ancient Rome? Interesting fact, huh? Which brings me to the Story Of The Week.
Let me begin with yesterday afternoon. Bubba called me on his lunch break to see how The Kid was doing, how my day was, etc. During the course of this conversation I asked "Did you see my Facebook status? I finally started my blog!", to which he replied "I saw that. That's interesting." "What does that mean?" I reply. "Nothing. I haven't even read it yet." he says. (Note: He really did mean 'nothing'. Bubba does think I'm a nerd, but he's a nerd too, so we're made for each other.) Ok. No big deal, right?
Later that night, Bubba and I conned my parents into letting The Kid stay with them so we could go out and have a nice dinner. Since misery loves company, we invited Bubba's next-to-oldest sister and her husband to join us. I love Bubba's family, and his sister and I are pretty close, so we always have a good time. I'm very excited about the fact that I'm no longer 'computer retarded' so I ask sister-in-law if she's seen the Blog. "Not yet" she says. "I told Bubba about it" I said "He said 'That's interesting'." "Oh no." she says, and laughs. She laughs and so does her husband.
"What?" I say.
"When you say 'that's interesting', well, that's codeword for 'that's lame'."
What?!
When did this happen?!
So, I got to thinking. 'Has interesting always meant lame? What if it has? When I did miss the memo? Was it that one day in Kindergarten when I was late because Dad had to get me ready for school because Mom was sick and I went to school in a sweatsuit with a sideways ponytail? This is all his fault!' Then I calmed down, stopped talking to myself like Mark David Chapman and began to really think. I thought of all the times I told someone something I thought was really awesome or informative and was answered with a "That's interesting".
"Did you know it takes 10 gallons of water to make one t-shirt?"
"Did you know Harley-Davidson made their first motorcycle in a shed in 1903?"
"Did you know that the polar bear is the heaviest breed of bear?"
"Did you know that hummingbirds can fly backwards?"
"Did you know that you can perform an emergency tracheotomy with a ballpoint pen?"
..."Wow. That's Interesting."
Now that I've thought a little harder on it, I realize that being 'interesting' isn't bad at all. Usually the people who tell me that only say that because they don't understand what I'm talking about. Like that kind of people who don't now what apartheid was or don't get most of the obscure references on Family Guy. So, I think I'll keep being 'interesting', and go around with the wonderful air of self-importance that comes with the knowledge that I rock at Jeopardy! because of it.

Hello.

Here it is. My first blog post. If you're reading this you're either:

1. My Family
2. My Friend excited to read what I have to say
3. My Friend who is excited to make fun of what I have to say
4. Someone with a 'Mother' fetish who accidentally came across this. (If so, my apologies. Pervert.)
   

So, if you want to know what it's like being a 26 year old wife and mother with no gainful employment, welcome. You might like, love, hate, relate to, or find funny some of the stuff I have to say. If not, well, too bad.