Dysfunctional Family Weekend

My family, like most families these days is pretty dysfunctional. I am the barely accepted lesbian, my sister is perfect in the eyes of my parents because she pooped out a kid and my parents have been divorced for almost 30 years. My father re-married a woman I cannot stand. My father has been in very bad health the past few years. Pretty much sums it up.

Ok, so I get a call on Friday morning from sister saying she and her family are coming down for a visit this weekend. Whatever happened to a little warning???? Then she mentioned she had spoken to my father and he would like to have someone drive him to this part of the country for a visit. Great. She asked which weekend would work for me and I told her next weekend.

She shows up Friday night around 8pm and has brought her husband! Normally when she comes to visit she just brings her daughter and we have a good time. I cannot explain why I do not like her husband. I seriously get along with just about everyone. When he opens his mouth, it is like nails on a chalkboard to me. He sleeps until noon, has lunch and then passes out again on the couch for hours. He is possibly the laziest person I have ever met. He does nothing to help my mom out unless she point blank asks for it. So, needless to say I was less than thrilled.

Saturday night I had ordered up the Lesnar/Couture UFC fight on PPV and invited over my boys to watch with me. My sister had said they were going to take my niece to a movie because they knew she would want to hang out with me and they did not want her watching fighting. I knew that they would be back around 9:30-10pm due to the time the movie started. What I never dreamed would happen is that my brother-in-law would just waltz into my house and plop down to watch the fights. Let me mention that my mother lives right next door. She was watching college football. Why on earth would he be so rude as to walk over and just come in?? It was a mood killer. We had been having so much fun until then. He sat there the rest of the night making stupid comments and ruining everything. Disaster. I wanted to stab him.

Today rolls around and I get a phone call from my father letting me know he was coming to visit me next weekend??? Last I had heard I was to drive to Oklahoma where my sister lives and would be meeting them there. He said, "Oh no, I want to drive through *&$^# and visit Gus." Gus is my mother's brother. She hates him about as much as she hates my father. Gus was in Nashville with one of his numberous girlfriends and decided to drive over to see my father. So now my father feels they are best friends and wants to visit him here. So my mother hears the whole conversation and is livid. "Why is that stupid son of a bitch visiting MY brother??? Did I ever go over there to visit HIS sister or HIS family????" This starts major drama and my sister's family packed it up pretty quickly and left. WHY COULD THIS NOT HAVE HAPPENED YESTERDAY???? Ahhhhhhhhhh!

So next weekend, I get the thrill of being around my brother in law yet again AND having my father royally piss off my mother. WHY ME???????????????????????????????????????

Tell Me The Truth, Do I Need A Shrink????

Lately, I have been a little obsessed with death. I think mainly because I had a few bad years between 2004-2005 with people close to me passing away. First was my aunt, she was only 53 and a skinny bitch. She had circulation issues in her legs due to an accident she had at work. They told her it would require a surgery to correct. No big deal right??? Wrong. She woke up from surgery and was fine for about 4 hours and then she went brain dead. That's right, my cousins and uncle had to finally decide to pull the plug. That was September of 2004.

February of 2005, I am in the middle of watching one of my favorite shows "24" when the phone rang. My girlfriend had answered and came to me with the phone very slowly. My mom was on the phone crying. She told me that my grandfather had died of a massive heart attack. My grandfather was more like a father to me than grandfather. I spent the rest of the night puking and crying. To this day, when I think of him, I tear up.

July of 2005, my bestest buddy ever, Bogey died. She was the very first dog I ever got myself. I picked her out as a puppy at age 19 and she had lived for 15 long years. She got very sick and I had to make the decision to have her put to sleep. I don't think I have ever done anything more difficult. How do you just decide to put someone you love so much to sleep? It tore me up.

December of 2005, after spending 2 weeks in the hospital, they diagnosed my grandmother with cancer. It was very progressed and there was nothing they could do. I spent a week with her at home with Hospice and 2 days after I had to leave to go back to Colorado she died.

I was unusually close to both my grandparents because we all owned and worked at our family restaurant. Their deaths in the same year have left me in a depression that I am not sure I have totally kicked. I did see my Doctor 2 months after my grandfather had passed and told her I cannot seem to stop crying. She asked me several questions and did not feel I was depressed, just sad and not in need of medication. DAMN!

Lately, I seem obsessed with dying. I think about it all the time. Like how I will die, where I will die, will anyone be with me? What will heaven be like? Is there football up there to watch? 3 years have passed since these deaths and no one I know has passed away in between so I am not sure why all of a sudden I think about it alot. Is this normal? When you get to a certain age is it something you think about more and more? Or have I lost my mind and need to seek a shrink?? I haven't really spoken to anyone about this so I thought, why not throw it out there for the 2 people that read my blog to decide? Shrink or no shrink? Personally, I am not a big believer in shrinks, I think in most cases they might be more messed up than the average person. But hey, maybe I am wrong. Maybe this death thing will pass, maybe it is normal...

I would be very interested in hearing your thoughts...come on let me have it!

My Day As A Recruiter

No, not gay recruiting. Truck driver recruiting. Bagpipes has been making the entire building cross train doing different jobs and yesterday was my day to be a recruiter.

I was there 2 hours and the guy told me I was already the best they had sent in to try this. I guess most of the new recruiters refused to take calls from the prospects. Well, what the hell??? That is the majority of the job.

By mid-day, I was thinking this is the job for me. It was so damn easy compared to what I do now. Less stressful by far.

I finished up and told him I would come back anytime he needed help. It was a day of peace and quiet to me compared to a normal day.

I cannot wait for my next cross training experiment. Maybe I will get to cross train with management...2 hour lunches and sitting in an office with the door closed all day doing God knows what.

Joan Jett Dream

I was having a dream about Joan Jett when I woke up this morning. I am very big fan of Joan's but I must say I had never had dreams about her before.

Joan and I have a history. When I was in high school, I thought she hung the moon. My friends and I started a band and we would try to be just like Joan. Becky was lead singer and played bass, I played electric guitar and Cindy played the drums. We were terribly bad but had quite the following of friends and family listening to us perform in Becky's basement. Joan Jett would come to our town almost once a year for a concert and we went every single year. But the best time was when Becky camped out overnight for us to get front row seats. She scored us the tickets and what a wild time we had! Becky and I hung out after the show trying to meet Joan. The best we got was a guy coming off her bus and asking us our names. He comes back out with a personalized autograph from Joan. Needless to say I was a little disappointed.

Another year when Joan was in town, my friend Cindy and I decided to chase the tour bus down the interstate after seeing it stop at Wendy's late that night. Bad idea. The bus driver obviously thought we were nuts and ran us off the road. Seriously. He did.

Flash forward many many years. Cindy and I decide to re-live our youth and go see Joan in concert once again. She is a parent of 2 and I am well...getting older. We decide to get there super early because it was general admission seating and of course we needed to be up close. We scored front and center! I jumped up and down, sang my ass off, and was slamming my fist into the air for 2 hours. Now, here is the really cool part. Joan and I had a moment. She was singing...and just looking at me. Seriously. The man beside me and my friend both turned to look at me at the very same moment, I guess assuming I was wagging my tongue between my lips or something. But I wasn't. I was just smiling and singing. When she was finished singing to me, she flipped me a guitar pick and get this...I caught it out of the air. OH yea!

So after the show we decide to hang around so I can try to meet Joan (Cindy got to meet her about 8 years before at a show where we live due to her hubby's Budweiser connection). So there I am when she walks around the corner headed for her bus. Me and about 40 other people. The minute she waved her hand to come over for pics I ran...fast for an old fart! I told her I have loved her since high school and I think I just kept saying I love you to her over and over. Yea, real cool. But I have a lovely picture of both of us all sweaty hanging onto each other. What a blast we had!

Flash forward again to this morning. My dream was Cindy and I going to a local bar for whatever reason. We get there and what do you know but Joan is performing there! I go up to the club manager and give him my credit card and tell him that I am buying Joan dinner tonight and all her drinks. Cindy was mad, told me I had lost my mind because she was pretty sure Joan would rack up at least $1000 in booze by herself. We go sit down in a booth and about 30 minutes later Joan comes out and sits next to me. She just wants to thank me for buying her dinner and the booze. We talk to her about some old songs that we love (if you can find these check them out...they should have been huge Joan hits..."Black Leather" and "I Wanna Be Your Dog"). She was laughing that we actually remember those songs and well...um, we start making out. My straight friend Cindy is very weirded out but I don't stop. Oh no. Joan and I are going to town. Then the damn alarm goes off. Disaster.

I e-mailed Cindy this morning when I got to work and this is all she wrote back, "You are out of your damned mind." Yes, I am.

Taylor Swift: My Newest Obsession

Ok, listen. I know, I am 37 years old and listening to music by this teenager but after meeting her back in September I have become obsessed and I am not ashamed. Nope, not at all. This kid has her shit together. She writes music that we can all relate to for the most part so after bugging the girlfriend all weekend for my free copy and not getting it (she said the label had not shipped it yet but I think she is getting a clue into my obsession and was trying to deny some pleasure), I drug my ass out of bed at 6am this morning to go buy a copy at Wal-mart. I was in shock when I could not find it. So I asked a guy (oh yea, that's right I chased down an associate to find a copy of this cd) and he had to dig it out of a shipping box. I think I might have been the first person to purchase it!! God I am cool. NOT!

Taylor was so cool, she hugs you like you have been friends for years and for the minute you get to spend with her she makes you feel like you are the only person in the room. I would not call it a crush because well frankly that's a little icky...she is 19 I think. I believe I admire her and appreciate that someone so hot right now could be so down to earth and nice. Lord knows I was a lunatic at 19 and have not improved much since then...haha! Besides, Gina Carano and Chelsea Handler will always and forever be my crushes.

So, if you have a spare $10 go to Wally World while they have this cheap and get a copy. You won't be disappointed.

Long Time No Blog

Things have been crazy. My job sucks as usual. My girlfriend is in another state.

Let's start with job sucks. Scotland Yard or Bagpipes as we have now nicknamed him drives me nuts. He decides to install a new phone system on a Wednesday. Really??? Middle of the week. Well installing the new phone system took 3 days and in those 3 days our phones did not work 90% of the time, our computers 50% of the time and our printers 30% of the time. Basically we just sat there complaining a lot. I have realized in 10 years with this company that I am more intelligent than 80% of management. It is a very sad day when you realize something like that.

Girlfriend-well I went to visit her this weekend. Let me just say it was not what I had expected. Granted we have been together for over 7 years now and I really thought I knew everything about her. Boy was I wrong. It seems that she is so depressed because of my absence she is not capable of doing anything for herself. Well, at least that was what she said. She had not done laundry since I had seen her. She had not gone grocery shopping since I had seen her. She had not cleaned her apartment since I have seen her. When she ran out of clothes, she went and bought new ones. Seriously. She eats out every night so she doesn't have to go to the store. So I spent my weekend getting her caught up on all of this. She said another reason she doesn't like doing laundry is because the place in her apartment building doesn't feel safe to her. So I drove around this big town until I found a nice safe clean laundry mat for her to do her laundry. I took her grocery shopping. Her dogs had damaged the walls and door of the apartment so we went to Home Depot to get the things to do the repairs. I would say the highlight of my weekend was getting to eat at PF Changs and getting to sleep with her in the same bed again. I gave her a huge pep talk and got her all caught up...probably just for another 3 weeks when I see her again. I never realized I was the strong one in our relationship. She makes all the money. I give all the pep talks I guess.

Tomorrow I have to go cross train...another stroke of genius by Bagpipes. I get to be a recruiter for a whole day. No access to my e-mail and not being able to do my job and being behind on Wednesday will drive me nuts. I actually thought about calling in sick. Wonder if that would get me fired???? Hmmmm...it is tempting. More blogging time...

Afternoon of Children Playing Soccer

I went to Oklahoma to watch my 6 year old niece play soccer today. We played out in the front yard for a little while before heading over to the game and I realized that maybe she wasn't really into this sport. I asked my sister what was up and she said she will run around but she does things like hug the coach in the middle of the game and yawn.

So off we go to the field and well, my sister was correct. In a 30 minute game my niece must have yawned 20 times. I saw her hug the coach once. She had two really good blocks where she stopped their player from advancing and kicked it down the half field they were playing on but that was about it.

I think what floored me most was the way the games are run. They play on a half field, they get a snack at halftime and all the parents make a bridge for them to run under after the games. Things have changed greatly since my one year of playing soccer as a child. I believe we played on a full field, there were no snacks at all and we were told to, "keep running until you puke." So as a super ultra competitive aunt it was hard to stand by watching her yawn and having no clue what was going on. I am screaming for her to slide over and block out one of their players, to back up and get in position and to keep running. It was in this moment I realized why I was not meant to have children. I know I would push them so hard in sports just as my father did me. Any child of mine might possibly kill me in my sleep after yelling at them a few 100 times to "run until you puke!"

It was a fun afternoon and very entertaining. I love my niece dearly but I think she might want to stick to gymnastics at this point.