No Spoilers Ahead: Me mommy and Corey went to see Goodnight Mommy. Corey was late so we couldn’t get a mask. They were handing out masks because it was the mask the twin boys wore to scare their mom. Their mom had plastic surgery and they wanted their mom back because they thought she was acting differently. They looked like our friend Kara’s son Harland but older. So Kara should be scared. When it was over I said that wasn’t scary that was sad. It wasn’t English it was German. But don’t worry it had subtitles. I almost fell down the stairs but that doesn’t matter. You could sometimes see the moms man boobs sometimes. That’s when I covered my eyes. Mommy had to cover her eyes sometimes, too. But I’m not going to say why because that would be a spoiler. I didn’t understand the movie it was strange and creepy. After mommy and Corey explained what it was about I understood it. I was sad mommy was scared. We saw it at the Hollywood Theatre in Dormont.

I would recommend this movie to people who aren’t pregnant or have kids. There was no funny parts all creepy.  The movie is abusive.

I was the only kid there! (;    If I had a kid I wouldn’t bring them to see this movie. Just saying. But you suit you. I’m not your MOM.

Yesterday, I remembered this old Lip Service Asian-style smoker’s jacket thing that I bought ages ago when Avalon in Oakland was awesome and sold new shit and not “gently worn” basic bitch cardigans. Obviously, I’m too fat so sad to wear it anymore, but I paid a lot of money for it and I like it too much to sell on eBay or drop off at Goodwill. Plus, this was supposed to be my signature jacket for once I was turned into a vampire and I’m still clinging on to that, OK?

Chooch and I were bored yesterday evening. Henry was napping (what a shocker). I needed to take a break from the painting I’m currently working on, and that’s usually when I pull out the camera. Taking pictures always calms me down. Except for when Chooch gives me a hard time and then we fight and we hate each other and I make him an orphan and then Henry yells at both of us and there are tears and I threaten to smash my camera against a tombstone.

(OMG remember the unicorn in the wheelchair photoshoot when Chooch and I were unsupervised and far away from home!?)

Chooch was having a pretty good hair day so I yanked that jacket out of the back of my closet, knocking a bunch of other things off the hangers and then leaving them on the floor for Henry to pick up later. I had Chooch try it on and it actually kind of fit him so I asked him if he would wear it in pictures and he was like, “WOULD I?” as he gently stroked the faux-fur on the sleeves.

We originally had no theme in mind until we went in the backyard and saw that our neighbor Larry*had a shovel and wheelbarrow laying around, so Chooch grabbed the shovel and started digging. And that’s how this happened.

*(I have no idea who this guy is but Chooch literally knows every single person on our street; he’s much more people-y than I am)

My favorite memory of this jacket is from 1998, when I was having a big party at my townhouse (it was first post-high school apartment so you can imagine what went on there) for my friend Lisa’s birthday. One of my mom’s friends lived in the same townhome complex and saw me in the parking lot that night wearing this jacket. She called my mom and totally NARC’d on me, because she knew I didn’t have a job and made some passive aggressive comment about how “Erin is always wearing such nice, fancy clothes.” BECAUSE I HAD A CORPORATE AMERICAN EXPRESS CARD THAT MOMMY PAID FOR, mind your own business, cooze!

But yeah, my mom called me the next day and was all, “Blah blah called me and said…”

It wasn’t even THAT expensive, maybe like $150? Which I guess is kind of a lot of money for a sporadically-employed 18-year-old sometimes-telemarketer to spend on a jacket that she knew she was only going to wear twice, probably.

Hot Naybor Chris came out at one point to get something from his garage. He looked at us, did a double take, raised one eyebrow curiously, and then shrugged. God love him.

This was his own pose. I think he really liked wearing that jacket.

I just let him do whatever keeps him content and easy to work with. I learned that the hard way over the years.

And since Chooch was wearing his Never Shout Never shirt underneath the jacket, here is one of their new songs. They just released their new album last month and we were listening to it in the car yesterday when we went to visit our friend Ricky, and I felt like I was in a psychedelic haze by the time it played the whole way through.

I gotta hand it to Chooch for making me give NSN a second chance when he got into them two years ago, because I had way too hastily written off Christofer Drew. That kid is a fucking weirdo in all the best ways, and the new album is fantastic.

Chooch sometimes tries to get us to be “a normal family.” Like he thinks that by ironically referring to us as “Ma” and “Pa,” I’m going to suddenly know how to cook and Henry’s going to slap on a baseball mitt and suggest a rousing game of catch before “supper.”

But then I’m like “Well then you’re going to have to start speaking appropriately and not like you’re halfway to perfecting the Aristocrats.” NORMAL FAMILIES LIVE ON TWO-WAY STREETS.

(I grew up on a dead-end private lane that was only room enough for one car to drive down at a time so if another car was coming, they’d have to pull into someone’s driveway to let you pass. There’s a metaphor in there somewhere for my stubborn, bulldozing family.)

But sometimes, in between stupid animal masked photo shoots and spastic road trips, I’ll throw the poor kid a bone. So I promised him that we would play Life when I came home from work last night because he played it with his twin girlfriends (TWINS) and is obsessed with it.

(Or obsessed with the fact that he played it with TWINS!)

I FINALLY GOT MARRIED!

It’s been YEARS since I played Life and it seemed A LOT different and more complicated  than I remember. This may be because I was relying on Chooch’s wishy-washy instructions.  The career I blindly chose was TECH SUPPORT and I was so angry because I did something similar to that for awhile and wanted to die the whole time. And I definitely did not get that much money for it, either. However, Henry’s career was “Artist” and he made much less than my tech support gig.

I don’t think Tech Support was a career the last time I played this. New Life sucks. I want the old one back.

Chooch kept losing turns and having to pay bullshit fines and was so angry about it. He started to cry at one point but tried to play it off. But,  we have similar gaming tempers so I knew that his tears actually meant that there was a fiery fury being stoked with the Devil’s poker, so what did I do? I discreetly cheated until I won, bitches!

People cheat. That’s life. There’s your lesson, son.

With his peeps.

Modeling a t-shirt from Kendahl. It really makes his eyes pop. :)

Reppin’ PVRIS.

• School starts on the 31st. I’m simultaneously thrilled and depressed.
• Henry and I let him start a private FB account so that he can play games (ugh) and also have a way to contact us during the day. I let him add some of his family and some our close friends, and made sure that his settings prevented random strangers from contacting him. Everything was fine but then he figured out that he could add people to a group chat that Henry started for the three of us, so he started adding some of my friends, who in turn were like, “WHY IS MY PHONE BLOWING UP WITH FACEBOOK STICKERS? WHY DON’T YOU TRY PARENTING YOUR KID FOR A CHANGE!?” and I was frantically trying to remove people as he was adding them, WHILE I WAS AT WORK. By the time I got home, I marched over to him and yelled, “I’M DELETING YOUR ACCOUNT, YOU SUCK!” And Henry was all, “Now, now, kids. Let’s try to talk about this” but it was too late because Chooch and I had each other by the neck at this point. So I stormed off because fuck you for meddling, Henry. A little while later, Chooch came into my bedroom and sneered, “You don’t have to worry about me anymore BECAUSE I UNFRIENDED YOU.” Mother. Fucker.
  • His profile picture is Marcy. :(
• Chooch had an altercation with one of our neighbors. I’ve been trying to get him to write about it because it’s awesome. We’ll see.
• All of his neighborhood friends are annoying. I hope that they all stop playing together once school starts. OK MAYBE IT’S JUST THAT I HATE KIDS.

And that’s all I got right now. I need another vacation. Sucks to be me. Too bad, so sad.

I do this thing where, as I’m writing blog posts, I’m actually hearing myself talking in my head to a group of imaginary friends, kind of like when you’re preparing to take the stand in a murder trial by staring at yourself in a mirror and clearing your throat a lot. So while I was thinking of all the things I wanted to say in this post about Emarosa, my brain-voice was machine-gunning the words at such an alarming pace that I gave myself a headache.

In other words, I am fucking stoked as hell to tell you, imaginary friends, about how it felt to see Emarosa at Warped Tour last Thursday, a/k/a THE BEST DAY OF 2015 THUS FAR.

If you’re a new figment of my fake readership, let me give you a brief run-down of my love affair with Emarosa and why I didn’t give a shit who else was playing at the same time as them that day because this day trumps all. I fell in love with them in 2008 after Jonny Craig got kicked out of Dance Gavin Dance and picked up by Emarosa, currently in need a new singer. Jonny Craig was It for me back then so naturally Emarosa became my favorite band.

Jonny fucked them over big time in 2011, and so the rest of the band really had no choice but to part ways with him. Jonny was all, “Good luck Emarosa, you guys are nothing without me” and for awhile it was starting to look like he was right; they all but fell off the face of the earth, popping up sporadically to let Facebook and Twitter know that they weren’t done, they were still writing music and looking for a singer.

It took them three years, but they found Bradley Walden and proceeded to record their best album to date; it has never felt better being an Emarosa fan. My pride for them is so ridiculously over-the-top that you’d think Chooch was in the band.

Thinking of the shitty position that Jonny put Emarosa in (remember the MacBook scandal?) always leaves me with the bitter taste of chopped cabbage in my mouth.

(It’s worth noting that Emarosa only played the first leg of Warped Tour, and then a day after their last date, Jonny’s new band Slaves jumps on for the last leg. There was absolutely no overlap. #soblessed that the Pittsburgh date got Emarosa and not misogynistic, drama-perpetuating Slaves!)

I always get real on edge right before seeing a band that I’m super into, so around 4:30 (35 minutes before their set time), I started to feel pretty barfy, coupled with some intense pants-peeing giddiness. I mean that in all of the best ways, like back in high school when you would hide behind a corner, waiting to take a clandestine photo of Scott Dambaugh with your 35MM camera; or when you would have your mom drive you past his house; or when you and your best friend would walk “casual” laps around the mall while you hoped to spot him slinking about lazily in his billowing Stüssy pants, OMG IT WAS JUST LIKE THAT.

It had been raining, and I mean RA-HAY-NING, intermittently all day long, and it conveniently started up again right before 5:00. I was bummed, because Emarosa has been making huge waves this summer on Warped Tour, and were even bumped up to the main stage for one of the dates, thanks to their incredibly energetic performances. They’ve been growing more and more popular, and the pictures I had been seeing online showed that they were drawing really big crowds for a band playing on one of the smaller stages.

Unfortunately, the rain drove a ton of people clear to the other side of the venue, beneath the amphitheater’s sheltering roof, leaving very few of us to brave it out before the Kevin Says stage. By the time Emarosa came on, the rain was coming down in bullet-like sheets, and there were times I had to shut my eyes because it felt like my contacts were being knocked off my eyeballs.

But it was worth it. Fuck the rain! Bradley gave zero fucks about the weather and spent 95% of their set immersed in the audience. (The few times he was actually on stage, he was busy busting out basic gymnastics stunts and spinning Will upside down. He has done nothing short of busting his ass to win over the old Jonny Craig fans, and in the process, he has garnered a ton of new recruits as well. If I wasn’t such a blathering mess in these situations, I would like to hug him and thank him for breathing new life into Emarosa. And then I’d like to grovel in the faces of Will and Jordan about how grateful I am that they didn’t stop trying and how I never gave up, and how proud I am of them and most of all, fuck Jonny Craig! He was nothing but poison. I wasted so much time defending him when all he gave back was slurred performances and humiliating encounters. I’m too old to fuck around with that.

Moments after the above picture was taken, Bradley had crowd-surfed his way over to where I was standing and I got to touch him and was like OMFG about it for the rest of the day. Chooch likes to tell everyone that I cried, but I promise you I didn’t actually cry. I only cried once all day, and that was during PVRIS’s set. (MORE ON THAT IN ANOTHER POST.)

This was actually only my seventh time: 3x with Jonny as the singer, once with Tilian Pearson who was filling in when Jonny was forced to go to a detox facility, and 3x with Bradley. I am here to report that this was the best performance of them all. I was so excited that this was Chooch’s first time getting to see them live! He seemed really into it, and we were right in front of the barrier so he could see perfectly (not like Bradley was ever on the stage!) but there was a moment when I looked over my shoulder at Chooch and he was making this anguished face, so I thought to myself, “Oh boy, here we go. The Brat is surfacing.” Because he has a pretty low threshold when it comes to doing things he doesn’t want to be doing, so I thought maybe he had grown tired of Emarosa so quickly and was about to start whining about wanting to go home.

Boy, sit yo’ ass down. We ain’t leaving when Pierce the Veil is on next!

Anyway, I found out later that his contorted face was out of repulsion because there was a couple behind me who were making out, God forbid.

Just, wow. Bradley proves over and over that Jonny isn’t the only golden-throated angel in this scene. It makes me laugh that after Bradley had joined the band, Jonny was tweeting about how Emarosa wasn’t “allowed” to ever play “his” songs again, but they are. And Bradley is KILLING IT. “Set It Off Like Napalm” coming out of his mouth is almost too much for me to handle.

If we’re being honest here, I don’t think Emarosa is going to be this scene’s best kept secret much longer. They are too good and deserve mainstream success. I’m rooting for them so fucking hard.

***

Right after the last song ended (1996 On Bevard!), Bradley said he was going to be at their merch tent meeting everyone; after dropping the mic, he ran straight up that soggy, muddy hill, true to his word. We quickly followed, and thanks to the still-heavy rain, only about 20 people beat us there. There was a little bit of time to spare before Pierce the Veil, so I asked Chooch if he would be my proxy and meet Bradley and Chooch was like, “Yeah, duh.”

He’s clearly a pro at rubbing elbows with bands now, you guys.

“I dare you to tell him that he’s better than Jonny,” I said, laughing as we stood in line.

“What will you give me if I do?” he immediately asked, his wagering cap securely fastened under his chin. It’s never free with him! What happened to the days when the mere act of accepting and completing a dare was all the glory needed?

So I promised him a dollar. That little crook.

I know Chooch already posted this picture in his own blog post, but it is too glorious not to repost over and over again.

God I can’t even remember what happened now when it was Chooch’s turn, I was shaking so bad. But I will tell you that right after I took this picture, Chooch started to walk away but then turned back and said, “You’re better than Jonny.”

“Thanks, man!  I agree,” Bradley said, propelling me into a tailspin of IS THIS REAL LIFE.

I shot myself with a horse tranquilizer just in time to chime in with, “We’re Team Emarosa!” Bradley probably said “thanks” or something, but I couldn’t hear past the psychotic ringing in my ears.

“You’re so goddamn awkward,” Henry said after we walked away. WTF I felt like I was being pretty OK and normal for once? I dwelled on it on for the rest of the day, trying to recreate in my head what I must have sounded like. Probably Bullwinkle. So, thanks, Henry. I’m glad you fucking fell down the hill!

***

I’ve been going through serious withdrawals like I always do after a show, particularly Warped Tour. But the good news is that I’M GOING TO SEE EMAROSA AGAIN TOMORROW NIGHT IN CLEVELAND, WOO!

Hello world. This is Chooch and I’m going to tell you about what I did at Warped Tour. The first half, Erin.Is.Bae will do the second.

Part I: Pvris

I met Lynn Gunn at Warped Tour and I was so happy. I wanted to do that all day. And it was towards the end I met her. I was lucky because I was going to be the last person in line but someone begged the guy to go behind me. Because he didn’t want to look like a jerk in front of me. So I was 10x more happier. She’s in a band named PVRIS and they’re my number 1 favorite Band. They aren’t that old of a band they are pretty new. They’re from Boston.

Part II: NSN

I also enjoyed watching NeverShoutNever they were good. A lot of girls probably cried but I couldn’t hear over the noise. He used to have brown hair but now he has blonde hair. If you like BryanSTARS (Who does?) you might know he did a interview with Chris like about 2 years ago and Chris said that he didn’t want to answer bullshit questions to Bryan and he cried. It was actually sad.

Part III: We Came As Romans

I loved them! I saw them at my FIRST Warped Tour. I really want to meet them but I cant because they wont do a meeting*.

*(Erin here: I think they did do a meeting but it conflicted with something I wanted to do. And what I want to do trumps all.)

You should listen to them right now! Here’s a link to my favorite song:

I’m listening to them right now while I’m writing this. I really like them.

Part IV: Bradley

I met Bradley from Emarosa and mommy cried because she touched him. Also when we watched them people were making out behind me and I was really mad. His arms all warm and his hair was wet because shitty weather has to happen. I also told him that he’s better than Jonny. (In case you don’t know who Jonny is he used to be the singer of Emarosa and mommy liked him and now hes a douchebag and in a band named Slaves.)

VI: Merch

Well, I got CDs, shirts, comic book, two water bottles (one that I already broke the very next day and one that’s meant to be taken outside that I got for free by saying SKATER MOM to the people at the Vans tent), and gross stickers that came with a Koo Koo Kanga Roo CD called Gross.

Clearly, now you know why I like to go to Warped Tour: bands, music, meetings, merch!

 [Erin.Is.Bae here: I’m gonna owe him a damn cabbage roll now for writing this.]

It rained A LOT over the weekend, so when we had a little bit of a reprieve on Sunday afternoon, I begged Chooch to go for a walk with me. And then, since he got to buy a new Skylander on Saturday, I guilted him into letting me take more pictures of him, because I was bored as fuck. (This happens every time I designate a “chill” weekend. I am just not meant to sit at home.)

Henry, barely glancing up from the couch, mumbled, “Be careful” as we walked out the door.

There are a lot of creepy alleys in Brookline, so we picked one and went from there.

Chooch’s dumb mouth set off a series of dog-barking, which was totally annoying and brought a ton of attention to the two a-holes slinking around suspiciously behind houses. As we neared what seemed to be the alpha dog on the street, I mistakenly said, “Hi buddy!” which alerted, I am not shitting you, EIGHT MORE DOGS to come charging at the fence from the side of the house.

Granted, they were all really small dogs, terriers and things like that (I’m bad with recognizing canine breeds), but their barks were way bigger than the large alpha dog guarding the gate. Chooch and I cracked up because it was so cartoon-ish how this herd of tiny dogs just materialized seemingly out of nowhere.

I bet that street doesn’t have a burglary problem.

His face is always dirty.

Chooch got this shirt from the Pierce the Veil show in Lancaster when he was 6. I think it’s an Adult XS and now it almost doesn’t fit him anymore! :(

Yes, please. Pretend like you’re breaking and entering. Alert more hounds.

I like this one because it looks like he’s in a “DON’T COME NEAR ME!” stance, which is lovely and sends all the right messages to Child Protective Services.

Almost all of Chooch’s time these days is monopolized by the neighborhood kids (he has a fan club — they sit on the porch and wait for him) so I was happy that he gave me 30 minutes of his precious time. He actually didn’t even bitch about it once we got out of the door!

I’m pretty sure the only reason Chooch agreed to go on this walk with me is because he was hoping to stumble upon his GIRLFRIEND.

On the way home, we walked past succulent city! Some house had a whole shit load of succulents in long troughs and I plucked one of the leaves right the fuck off so I could take it home and propagate it because “propagate” is now a regular part of my vocabulary. Chooch was appalled that I “stole” this, but no dogs barked so it was an easy getaway.

***

Later that night, I was inspired by the upcoming premier of the new MTV Scream series (and also my brother Corey’s fanatical texts while watching MTV’s Scream marathon) to revisit the first Scream movie. Somehow, Chooch has lived nine years without ever seeing it (though he does know about it), so he ran upstairs to grab his blanket and then settled in on the couch with Henry and me in a rare, American family moment. (Henry will usually go in the other room and pretend like he’s doing important things on the computer when we watch horror movies because he’s scared.)

“That lady looks familiar,” Chooch said at one point.

“She was on ‘Friends,'” I said, and then he knowingly said, “Oh yeah. Courtney Cox.”

This cracked me up, that a nine-year-old knows Courtney Cox’s name because of ‘Friends’.

Anyway, after Scream ended, Chooch emphatically announced, “I LOVED IT.” And then, after thinking about it, he added, “I didn’t know it was going to be so funny, too.” Nothing fazes him.

Incredibly, Chooch agreed to an impromptu photo shoot today when I came home from work and didn’t even ask for money or Skylanders in return. And I know exactly why.

Chooch has a “girlfriend” apparently. She’s someone from his class and before school ended, they exchanged Instagram names. So now he’s all about pictures of himself, so that he can post them and then tag her to see if she’ll say anything. Usually it’s things like, “You’re weird.”

So he was like, “Yeah let’s do this thang.”

His go-to pose.

His hair combined with his loud mouth make it easy to keep tabs on him when he’s out and about.

Obligatory Flock of Seagulls shot.

In other news, taking in-focus photos is becoming increasingly harder for me to accomplish because my eyesight is getting so horrible but I still haven’t made an appointment to get them checked because I LIVE DANGEROUSLY. Also because I constantly forget to do adult things.

Daddy was so happy when he dropped us off because he didnt have to go. We were in line for an 1hr and 2 cars went in a 1 way lane like right toward each other and it was crazy and then some broad was talking to us about stuff. And I had garbage in my hand when the garbage dude came by and I had to chase him in front of EVERYONE! But then another garbage dude came by and I was so embarrassed.

1ST we saw Nick Santino. Kellen Quinn was watching it and the girls in front of us saw him first and then 3 seconds later everyone saw him. I liked his music it was cool and he did a cover of Nirvana. Kellen said “F***!” and Nick said “That’s a f****** bad word Kellen.”

2nd We saw The Summer Set and first they played Maybe Tonight. I sang along to every song but it was the song Legendary when Pittsburgh f***** up and didn’t sing the part. Legendary was the last song and I was so happy. I had to pee so I went to the bathroom with mommy because I didn’t know where the bathroom was. And when I went in the bathroom Josh the guitarist for The Summer Set was in there and if it was Brian Logan Dales the singer I would be like OMG WOW WOW OMG. So when we went back upstairs we lost our spot so we went in the back to watch Sleeping With Sirens. Oh yeah almost forgot when during The Summer Set Brian said look around around you and I waved at some girl. Oh yeah and when Kellen came out for Sleeping With Sirens everyone screamed and my ears started to bleed.  Then I got 2 shirts and McDonald’s since it was right next to the Altar Bar. Oh yeah it was my first time at the Altar Bar and it was fun.

I felt so bad for Chooch at Warped Tour last summer, because he loves The Summer Set so much (see one of his guest posts here from two years ago!) and he ended up being so sick that day that he could barely enjoy it. So when I saw on Kellin Quinn’s Instagram that his band (Sleeping With Sirens) was going to do a limited-date, small venue acoustic tour and they were taking The Summer Set with them, I knew that would be the perfect birthday present for Chooch. But then I saw the venue for Pittsburgh was the Altar Bar, which is pretty small and SWS typically sells out bigger venues than that, so I sat at my desk at work and made sure I bought tickets the exact second they went on sale. And it’s a good thing too, because that bitch sold out fast.

But then I had anxiety, because what if it was a bad idea. Sold out shows are a bitch to contend with for adults, let alone when you have a nine-year-old in tow. “But it’s acoustic,” I reminded myself. “It will just be a roomful of hysterical teenaged girls.”

Probably not too hazardous.

But then I had different anxiety, because what if the day rolled around and Chooch was like, “Well…I’d rather just stay home and hang out with the neighborhood kids.” Because he’s fickle that way.

To my surprise, he actually suggested waking up at 7am and getting there “early.” I mean…Sleeping With Sirens is a popular band, but not THAT popular. I told him we’d get there about an hour before doors opened to ensure that we could try and get a good spot. I’ve been to the Altar Bar enough times to know that there is a small area with banquet-type seating off to one side near the stage, and my hope was to get there early enough to snag a spot over there so that Chooch could stand on the seat in order to see.

Henry dropped us off at 5:3o and Chooch and I walked down an alley to get to the back of the line, which had already snaked around the block. Motherfuck.

Standing In Line

The line was relatively uneventful, no one was being unruly, etc. We all just kind of sat around on a sidewalk and prayed for time to speed up. Around 6:00, everyone stood up and the line began moving, like someone had sounded a cowbell and we all obediently rose and moved forward. Now that we were all standing, the mom in front of us took this as her opportunity to strike up conversations with everyone around her. She could have been Robin’s sister, plucked right of the 70s and dropped down in front of us in 2015. She had straw-like hair in a multitude of ginger hues and was rail-thin; her voice came out on a bed of gravel while she chain-smoked Marlboros and I was bracing myself to hate her with the smoldering heat of Snooki’s skin after an hour in the tanning bed.

I feel confident that her house is full of macrame, earth-toned afghans and beaded curtains. 

“Is that your brother?” she asked me, while gesturing toward Chooch with Burning Cigarette #17.

I hit “recall” on all of the catty judgments I was mentally inserting in my Ginger Mom slam book. This broad could stay. And then she and Chooch had some awkward exchange about how they both like The Summer Set while he made SOS eyes at me behind her back. Shit got weird with her a little later but I’ll reserve that story for this week’s bullet point post because I don’t want it to stink up the memory of Chooch’s good night.

Several staff members walked around and got everyone hooked up with their age appropriate wristbands. They were checking IDs for the 21+ wristbands and when they got to Chooch, one of the guys said, “I don’t think I need confirmation that you’re under 21 buddy, unless you have some kind of Gary Coleman condition.” Ginger Mom and I were the only ones who laughed at that because everyone around us was too young to know who Gary Coleman is. GOD THAT WAS DEPRESSING.

Doors opened at exactly 6:30 and everyone entered the Altar Bar swiftly and without incident, thanks to staff being on the ball with the pre-wristbanding.

Inside, Pre-Show

Once we were inside, I grabbed Chooch’s hand and we ran over to where the seats are, which is kind of like two booths forming a right angle. The one booth-seat-thing is right near the stage, while the other one …. oh fuck it, here’s a diagram that I drew just for your sake, Blog:

The crowd was already about 20-heads deep in front of the stage, and the first booth-thing was claimed, but the second one had a spot open right in the back, perfect for Chooch to stand on and not worry about blocking anyone behind him. Also, we had a perfect view of the closed-off area next to the stage, so we got to see the bands before they walked out on stage.

Two moms were sitting on the other end of the booth, and I got to watch as the one slowly and painfully texted with her daughter, who was upset that she wasn’t as close to the stage as she wanted to be, and it’s not fair that so-and-so was closer because SHE likes Sleeping With Sirens way more than so-and so, OMG! Mom was like, “Everyone knows that the number one rule for concerts is first come, best spot. You are fine where you’re standing. There are a lot of people further back than you. There is not such thing as fair. This is real life.” DANG MA, ALL THAT TOUGH LOVE IS GONNA BREAK A PHONE.

Meanwhile, the skater douche who had the other side of the booth kept popping up onto the back of it, and I just knew that as soon as the show started, he was going to plant his ass there and block our view. And, he did. He turned around every once in a while and I tried to claw out his eyes with my icy glare. Fucking dick!

The blonde ponytail belongs to the slow-texting mom.

Nick Santino

Nick Santino was the opener, and once I was able to verify that Chooch could see even with that motherfucker propped up in front of us, I tried to tuck away my ire because this night was all about Chooch and as long as he could see the stage, that’s all that mattered. Besides, there were several large screens across the room from us so anytime I felt the urge to actually see what was going on, I could just look there.

Chooch’s first real concert was Pierce the Veil at the Chameleon Club in Lancaster when he was 6, but I think this was a much better experience for him. His attention span is definitely better, so he was pretty focused on Nick Santino’s set, except for when he looked over to his left and realized that Kellin Quinn was standing in the doorway, watching Nick from the side of the stage. Chooch elbowed me and pointed, and eventually one of the little girls next to us also spotted him and then an excited murmur spread like scene-fire around our area as all of the girls began having hysterical fits of unrequited feels. I have to admit though that the general consensus was to be chill about it so that Kellin wouldn’t be bothered. There were several girls that shrieked his name and basically all of them (there were about 30 who had surfed their way over to our corner) were trying to take clandestine pictures of the poor guy who was honestly just trying to support his friend on stage.

Chooch thought this was hilarious and kept laughing and rolling his eyes. I wanted to tell him THAT COULD BE YOU SOMEDAY but I’m trying not to pressure him. Sigh.

(Nick Santino was kind of boring to me, you guys. Although, he did a pretty nice cover of Nirvana’s “Teen Spirit” which I enjoyed. “Guys, he really did say ‘albino.’ I googled it!” one of the girls near us yelled to her friends, holding up her phone. DOUBLE SIGH.)

Sometime in between Nick Santino and The Summer Set, I was popping a piece of Mentos gum into my mouth right as the Foo Fighters began playing over the sound system and I sadly realized that there was no one there who would appreciate this irony. Maybe the miserable dad standing next to me, but ew—stranger danger.

The Summer Set

Chooch was stoked by the time Summer Set came on and it melted my cold, black heart to see his little lips moving along to all of the words. They covered Ed Sheeran’s “Sing” at one point and Chooch LOVES Ed Sheeran, so he furiously dug his phone out of his pocket and recorded the whole song.

BLESS HIS FUCKING HEART.

He never took his eyes off that stage, except for when he was grinning at me and making power-fist motions when certain songs happened. He ain’t no part-time fan, ya’ll. He knows the discography.

^^ This is why I wanted to get there early. No way was I standing in the middle of that with a nine-year-old.

I have to admit that while I would probably never listen to them if not for Chooch, they are actually really great live. They kept my attention and also Chooch’s, which is really no small feat. I won’t go into detail because Chooch said he wants to guest-post, but I definitely was glad that I was able to get us tickets to this because he honestly seemed to genuinely appreciate it, and that’s amazing because Chooch might not be spoiled in the traditional sense where we rain down money and toys and electronics upon him, but he is certainly spoiled when it comes to experiences, so sometimes he reacts pretty blasé about things, which drives me nuts. Like, dude, you’re at an amusement park, why are you scowling?! Things like that have been known to happen from time to time and then Henry and I will start yelling at him for being ungrateful, which always makes me laugh because it sounds like I’m yelling at myself.

So I had a fear that we would get there and he would just be like, “Yeah, so?” But no—he knew he was experiencing something good and I could tell that he was taking it all in.

Plus, girls. He is ALL ABOUT THE GIRLS these days, and he got quite a bit of attention from them.

Chooch will probably deny this vehemently, but during the last song (“Legendary,” which made Chooch yell, “YES!” while hugging himself because: “I knew it, Mommy! I knew they’d play this last. I knew it.”), I for sure saw his eyes shining with tears. He is totally my son.

Sleeping With Sirens

Chooch wanted to just leave after The Summer Set, but I convinced him to stay for a few SWS songs. I used to really like this band about 5 years ago, and it’s not that I don’t like them anymore, but Kellin Quinn annoys me sometimes and I have seen them enough times to know that he’s probably going to sound eh, so-so, OK. However! I do like it when he sings acoustically and I felt that we’d be remiss if we didn’t stick around for a little bit. So after The Summer Set, I took Chooch downstairs so he could pee (he ended up being in the bathroom at the same time as one of the The Summer Set guys and was completely cool about it!) and then we went back upstairs and staked out a spot in the back of the room, where we prepared to have our ears shredded by the shrieks of 600 fan-gasming girls. And as expected, it sounded like Michael Jackson in Japan when Kellin Quinn stepped on that stage.

Luckily, the second song they played was my favorite, so we ended up leaving after 4 songs total, and I didn’t feel bad about it.

The crowd was annoying and it was a real sweat box in there, and not sound like some stupid VISA commercial, but seeing Chooch genuinely enjoying himself and, let’s face it, being a little starstruck when he saw Brian Logan Dales, was totally worth and I would (probably) do it all over again. I’m thankful that 99% of the bands he likes are at least in the same scene as most of the stuff I listen to, so it’s really not as excruciating as it would be if he was into 5SOS or Justin Bieber or whatever other prefab, manufactured pop band out there right now.

And if he did like that type of music? Oh well, I guess I would still support him.

(And by that I mean have Henry go with him!)

I am so grateful that Chooch and I got to spend a few hours together without fighting. Because that’s usually what happens when two people are so much alike: BICKER CITY.

***

I’ll end this with a picture of Chooch and The Summer Set from last year’s Warped Tour. He actually had a fever when we were there, oops.

It’s Henry’s 50th birthday! So here are 50 things that Chooch and I love about that big old mustachioed dumdum. (Chooch wrote the title of this, btw.)

Chooch’s 25:

1. He bitches when I  break my headphones: He says I cant get another pair, even though he buys me more.
2. He buys me stuff: He is such a prince.
3. He does stuff with me: He’s super nice.
4. He does stuff for mommy: He is a prince.
5. He loves us: He doesn’t love anyone else but us Oh yes, almost forgot he loves all his family members.
6. He buys us food: So we don’t starve to death.
7. He’s easy to make fun of: Like the times we go on his Instagram.
8. He cares about our health: When we are sick or hurt he rushes home from work or just gives me medicine.
9. He never leaves us: Yeah, he might get a little annoyed at us but he doesn’t leave us.
10. He’s never scared: We always hide from him and try to scare him, but he’s never scared.
11. He is smart: He knows a lot about nature at the cemetery.
12. He is strong: He was in the Service so of course he is a strong independent man.
13. He is practically a hipster: Don’t ask, of course you should know. (Hint: His Beard)
14. He takes us to concerts: Even though he effing hates it.
15. He yells at us: Its funny when he said SHUT THE DOOR!
16. He takes us to Ice Cream shops: Even though he has to get his pants on when he’s comfortable on the couch.
17. He teaches me stuff: Such as how to ride a bike, and how to swim.
18. He sometimes is too scared to go in haunted houses: He usually protects us.
19. He is too scared to go on rides in amusement parks: He might hate amusement parks.
20. He protects us from almost dying: He always protects us from scary drunk guy who walks on our street.
21. He gives directions: To very hard things me and mommy are bad at.
22. He fixes stuff: When mommy or me break something he usually fixes it.
23. He’s not drunk: He doesn’t drink TOO much beer a day.
24. He cleans stuff: When he breaks a glass cup or I puke on the floor he cleans it.
25. His Frowns: He’s famous for his frowns.

Erin’s 25:

1. He irons my clothes for me so that I don’t cry because I melted another favorite shirt or the entire house.
2. He procures fruit for me!
3. He’s not a poser: he doesn’t try to dress “cool” when he goes to concerts.
4. He has an extensive collection of Faygo uniforms. (Sometimes this is even what he wears to concerts because what does he care.)
5. He’s not afraid of emasculating himself by drinking SHANDY every now and again even though it’s not REAL BEER.
6. He takes any DIY idea I throw at him and does it better. (LIKE MY GET STOKED SIGN!)
7. He goes along with all of my photoshoot ideas, even if it means wearing makeup or a tutu.
8. He makes me lavender-flavored food & makes really great iced coffee for me even though he is NOT a coffee-drinker.
9. He supports my serial killer greeting card side business.
10. He pretty much lets me do whatever I want as long as it doesn’t involve drugs or other guys’ weeners.
11. He is super good at cooking with seitan and tofu even though he enjoys feasting on animals.
12. He used to like fishing but then we started dating and I was like *PETA!* *TEARS!* *MURDERER!* *BAD MAN!* so now he doesn’t go fishing anymore.
13. He LOVES when people need directions because he’s a professional driver and knows all the best routes around town.
14. He always has time to help his mom.
15. He always has my back, like when the Catholic moms at Chooch’s old school ganged up on me. (“Well, if they don’t want you to write about them being assholes, then they shouldn’t act like assholes!”)
16. Sometimes, in the dark, he looks like Bo Brady!
17. He got my initial tattooed on his finger because I told him to.
18. He’s OK with the world revolving around me.
19. He taught me to like vegetables because he felt that, as a vegetarian, I should be eating more than just pizza and grilled cheese.
20. He probably knows about more bands than your dad, whether he wants to or not.
21. He’s really good at cutting bangs. (Should I get bangs again?)
22. He said hi to Jonny Craig one time, lol.
23. He is so good at crafts and sewing and basic domestic skills, that you would think his mom was a Home Ec teacher back in the day.
24. He LOVES when people ask him about the Ted Nugent show in the 1980s.
25. HE WAS IN THE SERVICE. (I don’t care if Chooch already said it. This is an important thing.)

Now I kind of wish I hadn’t shared this with Chooch because I could have easily gone on for another 25, ugh! Like how he entertains my tradition of having Xmas cemetery picnics, takes me all over for concerts even though he typically hates the bands, and he eats funnel cake off the ground because by golly he PAID for it!

I had a horrible day while we were going to Sarris Candy’s.

We were having a normal day until mommy was hungry and wanted to go somewhere so she asked Chris and Monica. Monica said Serena’s so she started this horrible day. First of all daddy and mommy were fighting about that he didn’t want to go to Serena’s even though he did and mommy said that I don’t even like Mexican food even though I said it was alright. This is what its like being in the backseat while they fight: It is dreadful, unhappy, ugly, not funny, annoying, stupid, and not surprising.

So we went back and forth from home to Canonsburg and then Serena’s (It was closed) then back to Sarris and I fell asleep so I don’t know what else happened. When I woke up we were at Mad Mex (By our house. We drove 90mins to somewhere to eat that’s 10mins away.

). I had a Kiddo Burrito. It was huge!

I didn’t eat it all but I had half. It was freezing in there so I complained that it was freezing. Then at the end I wanted a Sopapilla but I got a Brownie Sundae basically because it was a brownie with ice cream and chocolate fudge. Thanks a lot MONICA! Oh and after that on the way home mommy said she needed to exercise. I said “No you don’t, Mommy.” She thought I was being nice because she wasn’t fat. But the reason why I said that was because she was DRUNK!

ERIN’S VERSION: This all happened because Henry is insensitive to my needs and made some asinine rule where 90% of non-chain restaurants are closed on Sundays. (Even Yelp was like, “Yeah, good luck with that.”) And then he gets snippy with me when I can’t find addresses fast enough and then accuses me of lying about a diner we passed but IT WAS A DINER AND IT WAS OPEN. He was all, “EVEN IF IT EXISTED, YOU WOULD FIND SOMETHING WRONG WITH IT SO I AM NOT TURNING AROUND.” And then CHOOCH is on some fucked up frat boy feeding schedule where he only wants to eat ramen and bowls of cereal at 10PM so he was in the backseat wailing about why did we even HAVE to go to dinner because he wasn’t hungry and just wanted to go shopping for Skylanders and we’re horrible parents for attempting to put basic nourishment over frivolous video game accessories. So don’t think he didn’t contribute to the verbal slayings!

Also, he named this blog post on his own and I think it’s JUST A BIT HYPERBOLIC, but what do I know about that.

The funniest part of this whole thing is that I wasn’t even really hungry. I WAS JUST IN A BAD MOOD LIKE ALL DAY.

IDIOT HENRY’S VERSION: No comment. [He’s still pissed that we ended up not going to Sarris, because “they have the best rum raisin.” Well, I’m sorry but we were all in a sour mood by then and I’m not walking into a magical candy factory under our black, vitriolic cloak like some gang of madcap cartoon villains!]

Chooch and I were on our own last Saturday morning. Henry had Judy Obligations, so we took MY* car to the cemetery so Chooch could ride his bike and I could fake-jog**.

*(Don’t worry; I’ll eventually tire of this.)

**(I can run for 2 miles and then I automatically stop without even trying to see if I have anything left in me, because running is boring to me.)

Right away, I was annoyed. There was another car there, parked near where I always park (I’m the ONLY person at this particular cemetery 99% of the time because it’s not as “cool” as some of the other ones in Pittsburgh, I guess. But I’ve been a regular here for 15 years and even though I sometimes go to the more popular ones, Uniondale will always have my heart. <3 So when I saw this car, my immediate reaction was GFTO! But then I saw they were Elders, so it was very possible that they were actually there visiting a grave; I gave them a pass.

Then we thought a ghost was there because we saw what we thought was an apparition, but it turned out it was just the landscaper kicking up dirt. After we parked, the first order of business was getting the bike out of the trunk. I kept pressing the trunk button on my key fob and nothing was happening. I got back in the car and started searching for a trunk release button in there, but all I saw was the hood release and other things that I didn’t want to touch.

Basically, I spent 30 seconds on this Rubik’s Cruze before using my Phone a Henry option.

He was at the doctors with his mom and I could tell he was trying to act like he wasn’t annoyed that I was yelling at him on the other end, because I go from, “Huh…I can’t get the trunk open” to “I’M GOING TO COME TO WHERE YOU ARE AND WASH THIS CAR WITH YOUR ARTERIAL SPRAY IF YOU DON’T FUCKING HELP ME GET THIS TRUNK OPEN NOW MOTHERFUCKER.” Meanwhile, Chooch was just standing there calmly, saying things like, “We can do this, Mommy. We can figure this out.” When all Henry was saying, “There’s a button on the key fob. Then I don’t know. I don’t know. I don’t know why. Push the button. Are you pushing the button? It works on my* key fob.”

*(Yeah, he thinks he’s so great because he got his own set of keys for MY car.)

I hung up on him of course and decided to instead Google, “How do I open the trunk on a 2014 Chevy Cruze?” because the manual SAID NOTHING. Yes, I looked in the manual! GOD. And while this was going on, I happened to turn around just in time to see some young hipster couple strolling around with armfuls of vegetation that they were casually pulling off trees, presumably to garnish their artisanal cocktails later that afternoon. UGH THIS MADE ME EVEN MORE MAD GET OUT OF MY CEMETERY NO WAIT HELP ME OPEN MY TRUNK FIRST.

While I was trying to read all of these idiotic posts on some forum, Chooch said, “Found it” and just like that, the trunk popped open. I guess there’s a release on the outside of the car, but it only works if the car is already locked. (I checked, so don’t even think about breaking into my trunk!) Turns out I need to take my dumb key fob back to the dealership and have it reset, and what I mean by that is that I’m swapping mine out with Henry’s and then he can deal with it.

And we had no accidents or other mishaps that resulted in blood loss! These are my favorite kinds of Henry-less outings.

I am so thankful no one was around to record Chooch & me struggling to put his bike back in the trunk (or as I call it: “The Nail Biting Conclusion To Figuring Out How To Open the Trunk”). We are barely-functioning cripples without Henry. Chooch was like, “We got this, don’t give up!” and, after having a minor rage blackout which left me with visions of pulling a tombstone out of the ground and bashing myself in the head with it, I was like, “Well, I guess this is your bike’s new home, Chooch. Say good bye to it. Or….we can all just stay here forever. BECAUSE WHY BOTHER.” I was just about to curl up into the Fetal Position of Defeat when Chooch moved the handle bars a certain way and we were able to shove that two-wheeled bitch into the trunk like we were regular wiseguys and the bike was a fucking snitch.

Chooch is a HERO!

I think it got my heart rate up more than the run. I HATE FIGURING THINGS OUT.

A few days later, Chooch and I were on our own AGAIN, this time it was just a simple walk down the street to CVS where I needed to get nail polish remover and I could hear Henry calling out the front door, “JUST nail polish remover!” and then I proceeded to spend $20 because it’s CVS. Anyway, Chooch’s favorite thing to do at CVS is read every single greeting card they have (he has always been super into greeting cards, so any future broad that dates him is going to get a card for every occasion). The card aisle is near the magazines, so as we were walking down it, he stopped and screamed, “JEFFREY DAHMER!” and then ripped this murder publication off the rack and started naming all of the criminals he recognized on the cover, which was most, so I felt simultaneously proud and worried.

“Oh, and Ted Bundy. Obviously,” he was saying just as some old woman nervously walked past us.

He might be fairly desensitized to this shit since he’s grown up picnic’ing in cemeteries, watching horror movies, and listening to his parents talk about the latest serial killer greeting card they made, but it’s counterbalanced with such an extreme love for animals and one sane parent (and Minecraft?) that I don’t think I need to worry.

However, if it goes the other way, at least he’s experienced with trunks.

I don’t know that I would really call this a tradition, but sometimes on Mother’s Day, Henry will act like The Best Man On Earth and take me to DelGrosso’s Amusement Park, about 2 hours outside of Pittsburgh, so that I can ride the fuck out of the Wacky Worm and shovel potato salad down my throat in the style of violent porno cunnilingus.

Or, you know, pie eating contest.

Plus, moms ride for free on Mother’s Day.

This year, we didn’t have to rent a car! Yay new car! We listened to Dance Gavin Dance THE WHOLE WAY THERE because it was Mother’s Day. Oh OK, let’s be real: every day is my day when it comes to radio control. The best part is that the stereo system is so good that Chooch chattered away in the backseat and I COULDN’T HEAR A WORD HE SAID! Ahhh, a mother’s bliss.

However, I did hear him pipe up from the backseat and request Circa Survive. I was like, “WHAT SRSLY? You want me to put on Circa Survive?!” and he said, “Yes. ‘Act Appalled’.” I almost broke my finger off in my frantic attempt to queue up this song post-haste, because I have been waiting NINE YEARS for my son to like Circa Survive. I used to listen to their first album constantly when I was pregnant with him! And I tell him that all of the time and he just rolls his eyes. But on this day? On this day, he sat in the backseat and sang along because that little fucker knows all of the words and has probably always liked them but he’s just like HIS DAD in  that regard.

 Henry pretended to hate The Used for like, 6 years!

God, what a great Mother’s Day present, hearing Chooch’s little boy voice singing along with Anthony Green. That was way better than the makeup from Ulta, and it was FREE!

My second favorite part of the day was when we got to Delgrosso’s and the old lady inside the admission booth looked at me skeptically and asked, “Are you….the mom?” YES I AM NOW GIVE ME MY FREE WRIST BAND, HERE JUST PUT IT ON ABOVE MY OTHER WRISTBAND FROM LAST NIGHT, THANKS.

And then right away, it was Wacky Worm time!

Chooch wanted to ride in separate worm-compartments and I threw an actual fit while we stood in line, and then accused him of not giving a shit about my feelings, and on MOTHER’S DAY OF ALL DAYS. Finally, he was like, “Jesus Christ, OK. Pick a damn seat!”

I hit my leg SO HARD when I sat down. The Wacky Worm is not kind to us tall kids.

Immediately after this, I went up to Henry and said, “FOOD.” He put in our pizza, came over to the bench Chooch and I were slouched upon, making fun of people, and handed me  the receipt. “Here. Listen for our number to be called while I go and order the potato salad.”

WTF? How did this become my problem!?

Of course, Chooch and I forgot about our big important task almost immediately, until I realized a few minutes later that a number greater than ours was being called. “WTF, did we miss our number?” I asked Chooch. So we got up and stood closer to the pizza windows, and I totally panicked while numbers were called out of order because HOW WILL WE EVER KNOW IF THEY CALLED OURS ALREADY?

It was so confusing and I kept emitting audible groans of disgust and anguish because why do I have to do this thing?

! It was probably the worst part of my day, maybe.

But then our number was called for real and Chooch and I had already devoured our slices by the time Henry came back to our table with his hot dog (which Chooch took from him) and the potato salad.

Henry is always the last one to eat.

Anyway, I was really mad because one of my biggest pet peeves is when Chooch gets food all over himself. I feel like, at the age of 9, he should maybe have a better grasp on his food-handling by now, I don’t know?! So I said, “PLEASE do not get pizza on  yourself, I’m begging you” and by the time I turned back to my own pizza slice, a glob of sauce had sluiced right off his chin and plopped right smack onto the crotch of his shorts.

I called him Sauce Crotch for the rest of the day and now I’m going to draw him a picture of Sasquatch wearing stained shorts, but don’t worry, he’ll also be holding a slice of pizza in his hand so it will look less like a menstrual mishap.

All you potato salad aficionados out there, ya gotta try DelGrosso’s. It is fucking ON POINT. I referred to it as “Creamy sex” once and I stand by that statement. Henry bought some shitty supermarket brand potato salad the next day and I was like, “Why do you have to bring this ghetto shit in my house? The day after Delgrosso’s, really? You’re killing me.”

On the Crazy Mouse, Chooch practiced all of his swears in one long tangent and I just don’t care to stop him from swearing anymore. Just don’t do it in school and I’m fine with it. Parenting sometimes takes mental strength which I do not have a lot of.  I feel tired just typing that out, to be honest.

There was some young kid on the carousel who had a 1990s Billy Ray Cyrus mullet and of course I took an entire series of photos, but I’m not going to post them here because I have a tiny shred of common sense that is telling me that might not be wise. (I’m trying to be smarter about blogging, and it’s been a struggle.) But my lord, was that mullet majestic.

The thing about Delgrosso’s is that once you ride the Wacky Worm and the Crazy Mouse, it’s like “………………….”

It’s a really small park and the rest of the rides are your typical carnival/county fair assortment: Paratroopers, Tilt-A-Whirl, carousel, Music Express, pirate ship…basically it’s a bunch of different ways to self-impose whiplash and/or motion sickness. I’ve gotten ridiculously sick here before, to the point where I had to lay down across a bench and pray to the Vertigo gods to reset my eyeballs and put the color back in my cheeks. I try to pace myself now, which means Paratroopers/45 minutes of nothing/ice cream/Music Express/45 minutes of nothing/watch Chooch play games/Tilt-a-Whirl/OMG I’M DYING LET’S LEAVE/go home.

Chooch is like, “I can’t wait until I can ride this shit with my friends and not my weird MOM.”

I couldn’t get  my eyeballs to stop moving back and forth after this ride and it was concerning.

We let Chooch go off and buy his own drink and then for a good 5 minutes there was a mild concern that he had been kidnapped. Don’t worry, he came back to us. Just like a boomerang.

A sweaty, foul-mouthed boomerang.

I wonder what it’s like to be Chooch.

Pre-Tilt-a-Whirl nausea.

The Tilt-a-Whirl was being worked on all day but we just happened to be standing near it when they declared success and a Delgrosso’s ride operator walked on to give it one more test run.

“IS IT OK NOW?” I called up to him, and he kind of nodded, sort of, so Chooch and I raced to get in line and Henry was like, “Seriously? The gate isn’t even open yet.” It took everything in my power not to turn around and shout “FIRST!!!” in the faces of the asshole kids behind us. MOVE A LITTLE FASTER NEXT TIME.

I guess the ride operator was trying to overcompensate for the ride being closed all day, because he left us on there for a good three minutes.

That’s about two minutes too long in Spinny Ride Time.

And you know how sometimes the Tilt-a-Whirl is a big fat dud? Your car doesn’t get any good spins? Well, this particular go-around was chockfull of violent spins, which were ultra giggle-inducing at first, but then it quickly turned to stomach-churning and I was afraid that I was going to giggle chunks of potato salad right out of my open mouth, so I was pretty quiet for the last two minutes.

When I stumbled off the ride, Henry was waiting there to say, “Good for you” with that smug fucking look on his face. And then, “So, I guess you’re ready to go home then?”

Twist my arm.

But first! One last ride on the Wacky Worm. Never too sick for the Wacky Worm. (Until I am.)

I wanted Henry to carry me to the car but he was just like, “You haven’t lost THAT much weight.”

***********

The next day, we were in our weekly meeting and our boss asked if we all had a nice Mother’s Day. Glenn spoke up and said, “Tell everyone what you did, Erin!” because he knows I hate talking in our meetings, so I mumbled that I rode the Wacky Worm but out of everyone in the room that day, only Glenn and Amber1 know about my Wacky Worm obsession so I mumbled a brief explanation and everyone was kind of like, “Oh. Ok.”

#misunderstood
FUN FACT: If you Google image search “Wacky Worm”, a picture of Glenn comes up on the first page.

On Mothers Day we went to Delgrosso’s  and I had a fun day.  Of course Mommy wanted to go on the Wacky Worm first because she’s obsessed with it. So we went to the bathroom first because if I say I have to go the while we’re there daddy will get pissed. So after the Wacky Worm we went on the Crazy Mouse and  a lot of the rides were getting maintenance checked and we waited in line for a while. Since the ride only has 5 carts we went on in like 5minutes. Then mommy and  I went on the Music Express and the Umbrellas. Then  I got ice cream which was Chocolate Marshmallow and I wanted to go on the Pirate Ship (aka Pharaoh’s Fury) by MYSELF because Daddy never gets a bracelet and mommy didn’t want to get sick because she wanted to go on more rides. While I was in line Daddy was EATING my ice cream and I only had a quarter  of it and daddy had half . In line I screamed at him and the people in front of me laughed.

But mommy gets to eat ALL of her ice cream (she just said “Because I’m the best”)

Daddy gave me 1 dollar for 1 game to win on and I picked  a game where you have to put BALLS IN A CLOWN’S MOUTH (which sounds so wrong) It was pretty easy minus the fact fact where you have to get 1 ball in each slot. It took me 2 tries to win. I won this CUTE ,PURPLE ,FLUFFY ,DELIRIOUS , AND PRETTY  PIG. I won it for mommy and then she said “Oh thanks, you can keep It in your room though.” I was okay with that. We named him Pukey JR. Then mommy and I went on the Tilt-a-Whirl which was under maintenance but we were the first people on the Tilt-a-Whirl since the whole day. It wasn’t a surprise but every time mommy wants to go on the Tilt-a-Whirl she gets sick. The last ride of the day was the Wacky Worm. We had a fun day at Delgrosso’s.

(BONUS!!!) The day before Delgrosso’s daddy and I went to Michael’s then Ulta to get mommy a present for Mothers Day. I really wanted a sticker book for while we are going to Delgrosso’s and in the car  for 2 hours. Daddy wondered how much it was I said 13 US DOLLARS and 20 CANADIAN DOLLARS. He said “OH HELL NO I BUY ENOUGH S*** FOR YOU!” I threw a fit the whole way into Ulta and I put on makeup in there and daddy was pissed. On the way back home from Delgrosso’s we went to a restaurant called Valley Dairy. Our waitress was named Sarah and some waiter was basically doing our whole service because Sarah was slow and having a rough ,rough day. (Speaking of having a rough day, Sarah in my class was having a rough day because her nose was bleeding like all day Tuesday and Wednesday.)

Sarah finally came to our service and asked for our order. After dinner I ordered a Clown Sundae and I sadly made fun of it and mommy said Sarah was having a rough day. I liked the sundae though that’s all that matters.