Oh Honestly, Erin

Me, telling Henry & Chooch what I want to do on Mother’s Day: “I want to go to Columbus, as we discussed. And then on Mother’s Day Eve—“

Chooch, while Henry mumbled similar sentiments: “NO. That is NOT a thing!”

It is when you’re living under *my* roof, bitches.

****

• In other news, my blog was hacked again or something, I don’t know. It was down almost all day until Henry came home from work and dealt with it because I cared but also didn’t care?

• I’m still recovering from the weekend which is incredibly sad. I just really cannot handle alcohol in this moderately old bitch season of my life. I think I’m more socially hung over than anything else though (in a good way!).
• I asked Henry to put a temporary moratorium on the DAILY coffee runs to Dunkin Donuts (did I already mention this or was it in a dream) because each trip is nearly $20 and since we flunked out of HOW TO SAVE MONEY school, I thought that this would be a small, bare minimum corner we can cut in order to collect some extra monies for our summer trip which I will be borrowing against my 401K to pay for because again, what is saving money. Anyway, this is all to say that Henry had the audacity to suggest that we also STOP FEEDING THE SQUIRRELS. LOL he can fuck himself right over a cliff, byeee.

• We bought FROOTS at Las Palmas for the fiesta on Saturday. We actually only went there to get Mexican candy for the piñata but then I was like “and this” “and that” and as we walked out with our Mexican merch, Henry sighed, “When you plan things, you do it big,” and i was like “what are you talking about, this is just a super caj farewell thing that only requires exotic fruit, homemade Mexican sangria, beer, cider, a piñata, tons of candy, fiesta decor, and a cake from Bethel Bakery that features a picture that nearly caused me to flip my desk when trying to get coworkers to contribute to it?”

• I assigned Jaemin as Janna’s NCT Dream bias. I sent her several comp videos of him being a chaotic weirdo and she has accepted him with open arms.

https://youtu.be/1MyaBJhskMM

• I was so tired of Taylor Swift concert footage coming up in my reels on Instagram so I started blocking Swiftie fam accounts but then realized I could mark the videos as I AM NOT INTERESTED IN THIS and the reason I selected was “it makes me uncomfortable” because it does!! I don’t know what it is about her but I have never been able to stand her. Her music is fine – it’s so bland and vanilla that I can easily block it out but there is something about her stage presence (or IMO lack there of) that just makes me feel nauseated. Then I added all iterations of “Taylor Swift” etc to my blocked content keywords list on IG and I gotta tell you, it’s been fantastic.

WITH THAT, I am going to bed, man. Check back again for more unpopular opinions because my brain is a tree that grows ’em for free.

(DID I MAKE THAT OR HAS IT BEEN SAID BEFORE?? Wow I really need sleep.)

Hello! I don’t really have anything exciting going on (“When do you?” asks everyone in the balcony in the back of my mind) but I have some downtime in between my v. busy morning of writing correspondence, exercising, making a breakfast smoothie (I can use a blender-thing now!) and watching NCT Dream fan cams from the Seattle show.

I have been trying to be responsible by staying home lately on weekends so that Henry can get this fucking subway sign done. I know, I can go out without him but that would require me to either go out alone or make plans with other people but every time I pick up my phone to text someone like, “Wanna hang out” I feel sooooo tired. So, then I don’t. I have some social-y things coming up this week and into May, so I’m good, lol.

Anyway, he’s made great progress on the new sign but this is at the expense of my livelihood so…

Here are some things:

• Speaking of subways! I found *more* old photos the other day, just when I think I have finally lassoed them all up into photo boxes. I swear my house is like Mary Poppins’ tapestry bag. Anyway, I found a set of photos from my second trip with my grandparents and Sharon. This was my second time in London, but I think it was probably the first time I ever took a subway in any city, ever. I remember that we hung back from the tour group and did our own thing while we were in London, so that must have been why we were using the tube.

Of course Sharon has a Harrods bag. And that’s my Pappap and me in the background!

• In other back-in-the-day vacation news, remember back in February when I found a Christmas card from one of the families we had met on my first trip with my grandparents and Sharon, and I felt inspired to look up the daughter who was around my age? Well, I found what I had hoped was her address, sent her a card with my email address and IG handle, and then nothing happened for nearly 2 mths. I figured either:
  • • I had it completely wrong;
    • she emailed me back but it was directed to one of the OTHER Erin Kellys;
    • or she just totally didn’t remember me.
  • But then last weekend, I got an IG notification that someone named Olivia had started following me, and it was her!! I also got a card in the mail from her several days after that and it is wild to reconnect with someone after 30+ years. I’m excited to catch up and for us to start a new phase of our old friendship!
• All of this vintage vacation stuff has me so anxious to travel again. I know we booked our flights for our August trip but this fucking coaster club is being sooooo slow with getting the final payment info together. We’ve already paid into it a bit and this isn’t a new group or anything so if they end up saying that the trip is not happening, I am going to expect a fucking refund and then scramble to try and plan our own itinerary using the same flights because I am 100% married to this region we’re supposed to be traveling to. This isn’t their first big international trip either so I’m hoping that they’re just waiting for all of the parks to finalize things with them. They have confirmed some of the hotels (the one in Gothenburg is brand new – I was watching a YouTube video of its sneak peek soft opening and it looks so fucking beautiful) and several of the rides we can expect ERTs for, so there’s that at least.
  • The really annoying thing about this is that most of the information is being provided in the Facebook event they created for it so I have to use my dummy account that was created in order for me to be able to create Instragram ads for my stupid card shops. It’s just so infuriating when shit is done via Facebook. And there are already people who are annoying me bigly with their comments so that’s great. I hope there are some chill people that will be a part of this group! I think there are around 60 people who registered?
    • I started looking for a small bag to buy that’s bigger than a fannypack but not a full-sized crossbody, because I want to be able to tuck my vacation journal into it so that I can jot things down while in the parks rather than wait and try to frantically scribble everything down afterward in the hotel. “Just use Notes on your phone, Erin!” some might say, but I am very analog when it comes to “jotting things down,” lol. Also, I will want to be saving my phone battery for pictures/videos. Anyway, I think I am going with a bag I found from Baboon to the Moon because I like that brand. I WILL KEEP YOU POSTED, in case you are heavily invested in bags.
• Chooch turns 17 on Tuesday! I’m sad that he hasn’t been cleared yet by his doctor to be more active because I would have planned a weekend amusement park trip, subway sign be damned. I asked him if there was anything at all that he would like to do and he said no so we just bought him a new/bigger TV and he’s happy. I guess now that I think about it, when I was his age I also didn’t really care about doing anything for my birthday but I was also depressed because of my Pappap dying and the most I would agree to was having my BFFs Lisa and Christy come over and we ate cake with my mom and brothers in the kitchen. It was all I needed, really! But as a mom, I of course always want to something big for Chooch’s birthday so I will just need to shut my mouth and accept the fact that he’s just not into birthdays like I am.. :(
• My record player broke a few years ago and I never replaced it, mostly because it was around the time that I got into Kpop and so my interests shifted. But lately, more and more Kpop groups are releasing vinyl and I feel like the attic would be a great spot for a record nook so now I’m going to start to prioritize that, I guess. I can’t even remember what my old one was other than it was actually old, like a real turntable from back in the day and not one of these newfangled ones that people are buying at UO because they look cool but then chew up the vinyl. So, you know, no Crosleys for me, thanks. But I’m also not in the market for something super audiophile-centric and $$$$ either. I just want something reliable without sacrificing quality. I don’t know why I just plopped down so many words about this, how boring.
• Onion “we are closing, this is our last day” Maiden magically “reopened” 2 weeks later for a 420 pop-up event. I’m just so tired of restaurants acting like they’re motherfucking bands, getting everyone all worked up because they’re “disbanding” only to come back with reunion shows. I don’t know, maybe I’m just a disgruntled old people but the veg/vegan scene is so fucking obnoxious. It makes me not even want to be supportive of it, just stock my freezer with mass-produced veggie patties and call it a day. I don’t know, I got a seitan sandwich from the pop-up and it was just OK so I’m officially not broken up over this. I will just continue to patronize vegan establishments in other cities when we travel because I’m over this idiocy here. Also, the ordering process for the pop-up was just as jacked up as we expected. It’s vegan food, not a Taylor Swift ticket purchasing event. Either make a decent quantity of your food or don’t do it at all, get over yourself. Every goddamn city we have traveled to has had vegan restaurants that don’t close their doors after two hours because they “sold out.” Just normal-ass restaurants that you walk into, sit down, order, eat. Boom. Here in Pgh, you’re better off going to a regular restaurant that has “vegan/vegetarian” options on the menu, I swear to god. As someone who has not eaten meat since 1996, I find this whole “scene” completely appalling and pretentious.

On that note, I need a snack. Goodbye.

I don’t feel like counting today so let’s do freeform and not limit ourselves to just five things, k?

• I found out the other night that Henry has NEVER SEEN STEEL MAGNOLIAS. I am shook over this. I have been quoting from and referencing this movie ever since I saw it as a kid and he has not once in the 21 years we’ve been not-married has he once stopped me and asked, “Wait, what is that from? Oh, I have never seen that.” NOT ONCE!! Wel, until the other night. So, once! HE DIDN’T EVEN KNOW WHAT IT WAS ABOUT. I rapid-fire listed off the entire cast to him and he was like, “No, this still doesn’t tell me anything” so then I made him watch trailers for it on YouTube and then an entire episode of Donahue (LOL) with Olympia Dukakis, Sally Field, Shirley MacLaine, Dolly, and Julia Roberts (and later – Tom Skerritt!) which just made me remember how much I despised Phil Donahue as a kid. What an asshole he was, truly. But also, the audience members were FUCKING ME UP. They all looked like Barb from Stranger Things, basically. Even the men. Everyone looked like a mom back then.
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• Because I’m a big person, I can be real with you and say that after more than a decade of hating on Miley Cyrus’s music, I actually finally like one of her songs and Chooch pointed out that it’s probably only because she SORT OF sounds like Lady Gaga in it (“Flowers”) and I think he might be right. This song does give Lady Gaga vibes. But yeah, I like it so much that it’s the ONLY non-kpop workout routine I will do on the Give Me Five Thailand channel.  But yeah, I truly can’t believe I like a Miley Cyrus song. Who am I becoming. A 1990s mom in the Donahue audience.

PHUCK YOU PHIL.

• I was talking to HNC’s squirrel-hating wife the other morning. Cross-driveway relations have been calm and peaceful lately probably because it’s still winter-ish so she’s not out there trying to crucify my Buddys for digging up her plants lol. Anyway, we were talking mostly about Chooch’s injury and I have to say, it’s nice of her to be concerned about him, actually. But anyway, she was then telling me about how her 18-year-old granddaughter went to Georgia recently for a concert and because I’m a judgmental bitch ass, I scoffed in my head, “Pfft, probably some lame country singer” but then she gestured toward me and said, “It was that NCT, actually” and e-friends, when I tell you that I made my screechy voice ricochet up and down the driveway and bounce off the houses like a tennis ball when I yelled, “OMG I LOVE NCT!” – I’m downplaying it a bit. I kind of had delayed embarrassment that settled onto my mind after I went back in the house.
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  You know the kind, where you suddenly an instant playback of what you did and the only correct reaction at that point is one of OH SHIT LOL? Yeah, it was that. Anyway! After my outburst, she goes, “Yeah I know” and that’s when I realized that she was gesturing at me when she said “NCT” because I was wearing my NCT sweatshirt. Love being so dense.

• Went to dinner at Scolio’s with some friends last week and had to boomerang our wine bottle, which I kept as a souvenir because…that’s just what I do. I keep things. Yo, when we were cleaning out the attic, I found a PENNY in a ziplock bag with a piece of paper from a hotel that said, “LUCKY PENNY FOUND IN THE BOTTOM OF THE SAUNA AT OUR HOTEL.” It was from 1989!!! Did I throw it away after finding it in a box in the attic? NO, I MOVED IT TO ANOTHER BOX!!!!

• Did you read my story about the drunk Yinzer Jennifer Coolidge?!!?
• This morning, I was trying to hand Chooch his crutches when he was getting out of the car at school and he was like, “I DON’T NEED YOUR HELP, YOU’RE SO EMBARRASSING” so I said, “WELL I CAN’T JUST SIT IN THE CAR BECAUSE THEN I LOOK LIKE A DEADBEAT MOTHER” and his friend Zakk was just standing there like, “THIS IS WHY I KEEP MY EARBUDS IN.” Chooch-on-Crutches has got to be in Top 3 least favorite versions of Chooch.

• Henry won’t stop talking to me from the other room and I getting really mad. CAN’T HE SEE THAT I HAVE MY BLOGGING HAT ON.
• Today I saw someone spell broccoli  as”brochli” and I am to the point where I don’t know what to think anymore, come n’ get me, gaslighters, that I actually googled it before making fun of the spelling in case it was some new hybrid vegetable that they’re serving up at all those pretentious FARM TO TABLE establishments. No, just an idiotic spelling error. This same person also spelled potato as “potatoe,” so congrats on winning the Dan Quayle Vegetable Spelling Bee.

• My NCT Dream bias Renjun released this today and I am in love.
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• I just glanced over at Henry who is at the computer doing greeting card orders and he was full-body flailing to Aespa’s “Girls” but no, he does not like Kpop. I force this on him and he is miserable, he hates it so much.
  • OMG I just realized that he is trying to do the actual choreography, my face skin is flaming on his behalf.
• I had two different nightmares about the hawks this week. They have actually ruined my life.

Well, I think this is all I feel like writing right now. It was another long and frustrating week.

Here are some things that have happened lately.

• Um, you guys? I found out the other night that Henry had not only never played, but never HEARD OF the classic Nintendo game Dr. Mario?? That was literally one of my favorite Nintendo games ever, even more than Tetris. I used to lay in bed at night and see the pills dropping down in the blank space in front of my eyes, like counting sheep except that it filled me anxiety and kept me awake. Then I was inspired to play the Dr.Mario theme on YouTube and didn’t realize that was Henry was silently observing me as I zoned out and punched the air to the beat with my head and fist. I texted my brother Ryan to see if Henry not knowing of this game was a deal-breaker, but Ryan couldn’t get past the part where I was listening to the theme on a loop.

• A bunch of us met up after work on Friday at Buca di Beppo and it was so great seeing some people who I haven’t seen since the idiot pandemic (like New Dad Lloyd, who asked me of all people for parenting advice!) and also meeting for the first time in person one of the people hired during the pandemic. It’s nuts how much I took that place and those people for granted. I have such a greater appreciation for my work friends now, for sure. And I was cracking up because at one point Jill asked, “Whose children’s toy is this?” thinking that my phone case was an actual toy lol. And then I had left my purse at another table so people were confused because it looked like “totally an Erin Kelly purse” but they thought it must have been someone else’s since I wasn’t sitting near it. Then Sue was petting my blue faux fur coat which I also had abandoned elsewhere and I yelled out, “That’s mine too!” and she just shook her head. LOL. Anyway, we had a really decent turn out but I didn’t take any pictures because I was too busy getting lost in my white sangrias and bullshitting, but there is a group photo of everyone floating around somewhere which I am desperate to get my hands on because I’m obsessed with group pictures (literally when Aaron announced that we were taking one, I almost pushed Regina out of the booth so I could get a good spot, lol).
• As I mentioned in my last post, I started watching The Walking Dead again. My friend Carrie can attest to the number of times I have fallen off the TWD Wagon only to pick it back up again. I mostly have no clue what is going on anymore and Aaron, who I used to really like, is really getting on my nerves in these last several episodes, but I will always be there for the core characters: Carol, Daryl, Maggie, and yes of course Negan because has there EVER been another character that was SO HATEABLE yet went through the most humanizing growth?! I mean, obviously we will never get over what he did to GLENN (ugh if I ever need to cry on cue, this is in my repertoire), but holy fuck the charisma. Even Henry, who has never watched an entire season, is drawn to the screen when it’s a Negan scene. As hot and cold as I’ve been with this series over the years, I’m going to be gutted when I get to the final episode because it holds such sentimental value for me. It was one of the first shows that Chooch and I watched together – it was our Sunday night tradition! Lights out, blanket on, TWD time. We would actually get so upset if we weren’t going to be home for a new episode and I would have to stay off Twitter and Facebook until we were able to watch it because that was like THE SHOW that everyone LOVED to spoil back when it was in its prime.
• Chooch came flying downstairs the other night and said in his standard HUFFYSULKYBITCHBOY tone that he was looking for a place to ride bikes in the woods with like, ramps or whatever and couldn’t find anything so he asked if he could make one somewhere.

“No, because we don’t own land,” Henry answered matter-of-factly.

“Ok, well can we own land?” Chooch asked, like wow what an easy solution. He is so annoying.

• Stripes going in up in the attic! Henry, “Not a Professional Painter,” had to jerry-rig this plank-like thing to stand on and it was making me extremely nervous.

Pretty much the entire weekend was spent painting that damn room. Chooch and I even sort of helped for a minute!

• We took a boba break on Sunday though. This was our first time trying Love Tea and I think it’s my current favorite because they have a cheese cap option and that is my motherfucking jam.

• THAT FUCKING HAWK WAS BACK YESTERDAY!!!!!! I hate him so much! He was in one of the trees in the backyard so I was out there trying to make sure all my squirrels stayed still – one of the Buddys was so close to the branch that motherfucker was perched on and my heart was racing. I came back in the house and screamed for Henry to help – I remembered that a hawk deterrent is a mirrored surfaces, so I grabbed a mirror off the wall and gave it to Henry much in the same vein as someone would toss Daryl his crossbow, and Henry proceeded to shine it at the stupid ass hawk from the back porch. WE HAVE TO GO OUTSIDE AND DO IT I cried, so Henry sighed and put on his shoes, then went in the backyard and within 3 minutes of ricocheting the sunlight into the hawk’s face, we got the asshole to fly away! BUT THEN HOURS LATER, I opened the front door and he was PERCHED ON A TELEPHONE WIRE IN FRONT OF MY HOUSE STRAIGHT LEERING DOWN AT ME. We had a major stare-off while I made sure none of the squirrels picked that moment to venture up to the front yard, and then I finally wore him down so he flew away. Blake apparently was watching from his window and texted Henry “wow that thing was HUGE.” DID YOU TELL HIM I’M PREPARED TO FIGHT IT??? I asked Henry. I just hate how my life is like “going ok,” “going ok,” “going ok,” and then – HAWK. He is literally destroying my sanity and making me so stressed out. My body was racked with anxious tremors all day on Sunday. “Do you hate him too?” I asked Henry. “No,” he said simply. “I WANT YOU TO HATE HIM TOO!” I cried, tantrum on the horizon. “Ok, I hate him too,” Henry sighed.

I don’t think I have anything else to say right now. I’m hawk-stressed.