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There’s something* about Mondays that makes me want to abstain from all the words and just share a music video that we can all dance to together in spirit.

*(Oh yeah. Work.)

Let’s pretend like we’re all in a beautiful meadow, dancing with the adorable flower boys from 7 o’clock. OK? OK! 아싸!

I have vivid memories of being super young in the early 80s, watching Twice Upon a Time on HBO in our old house in South Park. This movie was everything to me. I used to make my mom rent it constantly from one of the tiny, pre-Blockbuster video rental stores (which was next to an arcade that I just learned recently that my Pappap owned, which explains why there were always arcade games and pinball machines in our houses when I was growing up.)

For some reason though, even though it was associated with Lucasfilm, it was really hard to find on video. I was on a kick as a teenager, desperately trying to find it, back when you had to get out the Yellow Pages and call places like Blockbuster and Suncoast. I eventually did find it, back in 1996 or 1997, and had it shipped to my house. (This was back before we used the Internet for every damn thing, you guys, so the fact that I was able to find it at all was a huge victory, and if we’re being honest, it was probably my Aunt Sharon who found it for me because she was relentless.)

And then there was this terrible night, it was actually the night before Thanksgiving in 1997, when my then-boyfriend Paycho Mike and I had a huge fight, one that involved him chasing me into my parentless house, and thankfully I made it into my bedroom with enough time to slam and lock my door behind me. 

He eventually left, but not before going into the family room, taking my prized copy of Twice Upon a Time, and running it over with his car. 

Janna was there. You can ask her! She was scared too!

So, that tells you how much this movie meant to me, that it was the first thing he went for in his mission to abuse me some more. 

I was able to find another copy years later, but it’s on VHS, and I don’t think it would play now even if I still had a VCR. 

It came up in conversation last night and I went on YouTube to find a trailer so I could show Chooch, who wasn’t impressed at all because it didn’t involve some douchebag YouTuber playing video games and screaming, so he went to bed while I stayed up crying to myself when I found the opening credits, which include Bruce Hornsby’s Heartbreak Town. 

MEMORIES. 

So I decided that I need to watch this again, urgently. The last time I googled it, all I could find was used VHS copies. This time though, I found it on DVD – at Target! I had no idea this was ever released on DVD! IT FEELS LIKE I WAS VISITED BY THE EASTER BUNNY A DAY EARLY. 

That’s all. Just wanted to get that off my chest. Fuck psycho boyfriends, long live Target. 

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Today at work, the mail guy wished me a happy Easter and I was like, “HAHA ok weirdo” but then I said, “Wait—when’s Easter?” and three people at once were like, “Uh, it’s this Sunday, dumbass.”

Why can’t Easter just be at the same time each year?! I can never keep tabs on it. I’m either too soon, like the time I had an Easter egg dyeing party nearly a month before Easter and none of my friends thought it was strange because they’re used to me not having a clue. 

Or it creeps on me unexpectedly like this year. I feel like I knew last weekend at one point that it was soon but then I managed to forget once the week started. 

My point is that I didn’t take any Easter pictures of Chooch yet and now I’m not sure if I’ll have time and I’m sad about that. And timehop is all super casually reminding me of past Easter portraits and I’m just like, “Suck a dick, Timehop.” It’s always nagging me to look at my past when everyone else is telling me to stop living there and I feel so conflicted. 

Maybe I’ll just go commercial and stick him on some mall bunny’s  lap. 

In other Easter-y news, Chooch is on spring break which I always feel should come after Easter but whatever. Judy has been watching him which is fine but with that comes some necessary tweaks in my routine. For instance, when she’s here, I can’t watch Running Man. We tried to watch it with her on Monday and she was open to it, but then she kept wanting to have non-Korean conversations and I was like I’m TRYING to watch RUNNING MAN. 

“Yeah but it’s not like you need to listen to it,” Glenn muttered when I complained about this today. 

“I LIKE TO HEAR THE BEAUTIFUL SOUNDS OF THEIR LANGUAGE,” I shouted back at him. God!

And then she washes our dishes and I really appreciate that but she doesn’t actually wash them, if you know what I mean. I pulled a spoon out of the strainer and it still had peanut butter on it, so I basically just dumped everything back into the sink. 

Glenn’s advice was to just reuse that spoon for peanut butter and I almost puked. 

My favorite thing about having her here though is listening to her and Chooch bicker like the Odd Couple. (The Odd Couple?! Hi, I’m an 80-year-old.)

For instance, last night, I wanted to light a candle in my room but didn’t have a lighter so I did what any parent would do and summonded my kid to go play fetch.

Immediately, there was a verbal scuffle between those two downstairs. Judy was trying to tell Chooch that there was a lighter in the kitchen but he apparently ignored her advice and took his search elsewhere so she kept yelling at him to check the kitchen and finally he was like GRANDMA I KNOW, THAT ONE DOESNT WORK to which she outmatched his volume with her retaliation of WELL YOU DIDNT SAY YOU NEEDED ONE WITH FLUID. 

????!

Anyway, Chooch found the lighter he was looking for (there are a lot less lighters in the house when no one is a smoker, that’s for sure) and brought it to me like a happy puppy. 

Except that the candle’s wick was down too far and neither of us could fit our meatfists down in there. I figured this was a grand time to teach Chooch my trick, and as he watched me rip up a piece of paper and light it on fire, he began to object but it was too late: I had already dropped the fiery paper into the candle jar, failing in lighting the wick but succeeding in filling my bedroom with smoke. 

Luckily, chooch had removed the smoke detector THAT SAME DAY because Judy burnt a veggie burger and set the alarm off and neither of them knew how to turn it off so chooch removed it from the ceiling and apparently wanted to bash it to death but then Judy took it off him and calmly removed the batteries.

Don’t worry, Henry will put it back.

Meanwhile, Henry was trying to sleep but apparently the act of his lungs filling with smoke woke him up and HOO BOY was he pissed when he saw us standing there, Chooch with a lighter in his hand, me with my PYROMANIAC cape on, with a smoking Yankee Candle knock-off between us. 

This has absolutely nothing to do with Easter, but there you go. 

I guess today is National Pet Day. How would I ever know what day it was if not for Instagram hashtags?

I just posted pictures of my current cats two days ago so I thought I would do a throwback to 1983. 

Here’s an old picture of my dad pretending to like me, also featuring his Siberian Husky, Blitz. The only time I ever saw my dad cry was when he had Blitz put to sleep. Man, I get it, Dad. I get it. He never got another pet after that. I always thought he was a jerk until I grew up and started losing my Originals: Marcy, Nicotina, Don, and Willie. It’s hard to know that I’m going to have to suffer that traumatic heartbreak again one day now that we have two new cats, but this house was just too empty and sad otherwise. 

(Though, full of FLOURISHING PLANTS but I’m not bitter.)

Also, that broad on the left in the picture is Connie, some girl who lived on our street. I just remember she was a Jehovah’s Witness and all that meant to me was that she wasn’t allowed to go trick or treating, which I thought was just cruel, man.

(Connie is not to be confused with the dumb bitch who left me stranded in her treehouse overnight – ok probably only for about an hour until her dad realized I was stuck up there. I was afraid to climb down, Ok?! To this day, I still freeze anytime I’m more than three feet off the ground, which is why you will usually find me panicking on a playground while Henry and Chooch frown at me in disappointment.)

#nationalpetday

Fine, here are also two pictures of Penelope plotting plant perishment. 

Pets are just the best. Never trust someone who doesn’t have at least sea monkeys or a fucking ant farm, you know?

Gotta go. Journey’s “Who’s Crying Now” just came on the radio and I have to go and accidentally wake up Henry with my overzealous bed-dancing. 

Fred pulled back the kitchen curtains and took in the typical Pittsburgh sky: sunlight struggling to be seen through clouds in varying states of precipitation.

“It’s another beautiful day in Pittsburgh,” he smiled.

A note clinging to his fridge against the weight of a Steelers magnet reminded him that he needed to buy more pierogis and pop, but first he was having breakfast with his best friend, Mr. McFeely.

Mr. McFeely was already waiting at a table when Fred arrived at Pamela’s later that morning.

“Fred, we picked a bad day to come here,” he spat sourly. “The place is full of kinderdicks!”

A cursory scan of the breakfast hot spot taught Fred that there were indeed many small children communicating their feelings in the cacophonic volume of basic banshees.

“Mr. McFeely, these children are the future Heinz laborers! The next Sophie Masloffs and Michael Keatons! They deserve to be here, eating potatoes lyonnaise, just as much as you and I.” Fred beamed happily, tucking a napkin into his cardigan.

“Fred,” Mr. McFeely sighed, “you are a good man.”

“I just really love everyone in my neighborhood,” Fred modestly waved off the compliment.

***

On the way to Giant Eagle later that afternoon, Fred’s car hit a pothole the size of Ben Roesthlisberger’s ego, splashing his Schneider’s iced tea into his lap. Fred shook his head and chuckled. “Maybe I should have taken the trolley!”

In Giant Eagle, Fred considered buying a pound of Isaly’s chipped ham but remembered he had 9 pounds of it in his freezer already.

“Will this be all for today?” the young, disinterested cashier asked Fred at the check-out.

“Yes dear, just came here for some pierogis and pop,” Fred answered, his avuncular smile causing crinkles to spread from his eyes.

“It’s soda,” she corrected him, making it clear she was one of those endearing transplants, here to attend college while constantly disputing the vernacular.

Fred took the bag from her outstretched hand, politely wishing her well while laughing softly to himself. He knew she would be calling it pop in no time.
***

When Fred arrived home that evening after a full day of tooling around town, some of the neighborhood children were playing a rousing game of Release. The playing field had spilled into his yard, but Fred didn’t mind; children were his favorite types of people. Especially Pittsburgh children.

Fred paused outside of his front door, smiling lazily at the sounds of prepubescent caterwauls and urban swears while casually sliding the gum band off of the stack of mail that arrived that day. His eyes had just fallen on an ad in the Pennysaver for the Immaculate Heart of Mary fish fry when his periphery caught a flash of something that made him involuntarily dry-heave.

It was a putrid color, the wash of ear wax.

The chroma of Cheetos’d fingertips.

The tint of Carrot Top’s unruly follicular chapeau.

The stain of Snooki’s skin after a summer at the Jersey Shore.

Fred felt the color drain from his face. His heart began thrumming against his ribcage and something of an unfamiliar feeling began rising up from his gut. It was a feeling he felt only thrice in his life:

● Once, when he was inspired to make his own crayons after airing a tour of the Crayola factory on his show, which resulted in him spilling hot wax all over his favorite cardigan.

● Once, when he came home after a particularly long day to find that someone had chucked his Pittsburgh parking chair onto the grass and brutally thieved his rightful parking spot.

● Once, when Lady Elaine Fairchild arrived to work drunk.

The orange flash was a Philadelphia Flyers jersey. On a child.
The feeling Fred felt was pure, unadulterated black and gold fury.

Shaking the Pennysaver—now rolled-up into a Flyers-fan beating apparatus—into the air, Fred hollered, “Get off my lawn, ya jagoff!”

****

This is an original painting that I made for a Pittsburgh-themed blog exchange I participated in. It’s ready to hang and the story comes with it!

Here are pictures of my cats, which I only took because I wanted to practice the Korean hashtags I learned this weekend.  Conjugating verbs < Internet lingo. 

Obvi. 

Penelope has spent most of the day sleeping in my closet. How boring. This was right after I woke her up so I could take a picture so that this post wouldn’t look like I was favoring Chooch’s dumb cat Drew. 

In other news:

• Henry has nearly finished painting a magnificant table for the back porch, which will be used for the record player. One night last week he was supposed to be in the basement painting it but really he was in the driveway talking to HNC, so chooch and I were trying to spy on them until HNC’s wife-thing came flying out of the house screaming about how she was going to fucking kill him. Henry said he wasn’t scared but holy shit did that make chooch and me take eighteen giant steps away from the window. Henry said HNC waited for her to go back in before saying, “Ain’t I lucky?”
• Speaking of neighborss: It’s been a week and I don’t hate the new neighbors. #knockonwood I want to try and suggest having a block party this summer. We’ll see. 
• Chooch’s piano teacher changed her name to Lavendar and now I love her even more and want to be best friends but I’m too shy-shy, hush hush, eye to eye. 
• Chooch and I watched the season finale of The Walking Dead last night and holy shit, I’m glad I didn’t give up like I was going to. That episode killed me, though. Henry and I got in a fight because chooch and I kept saying we were so worried about Ezekiel’s tiger and Henry was all, “It’s not even a real tiger. It’s CGI.” And I was like, “No it’s real” and then he went silent for a few seconds before shoving his phone in my face and saying, “Here’s the man in the blue suit that you’re so worried about.” Fuck off, Henry. 

Other than that, all you missed today was me overhearing our old grass-cutter Joe telling the old Polish produce guy up the street that he just got back from DC. He was there for three days. 

Cool story, Joe. 

ETA: I just saw that Kcon NY accounced CNBlue and TWICE (!!!!!) so the rest of my evening has been dedicated to whining, begging, and perfecting my lip-protrude. 

Today has been gloriously free of responsibility and plans – and I fucking love it. 

I actually slept in for the first time in months, watched The Walking Dead with Chooch (we fell behind a few episodes because I got bored with American TV, but now we’re almost caught up), did KpopX, and found an old Cinematic Sunrise shirt that never really fit me because I was forever fat,  but now it fits so thank you, Korea!

Later, we took a family walk in Homewood Cemetery and I wondered what we must look like to other people who are there jogging, riding bikes, or being generally normal, unlike us. 

Henry: First one to spot a deer—

Me, lying: Found one!!

Henry: —has to cook their own dinner.

Guess who had a cheese sandwich for dinner. :(

There actually weren’t any deer (I guess they all live in Allegheny Cemetery) but we saw a bunch of fat squirrels and ground hogs, and then a large turkey crew right before we got back to our car. 

Chooch fell off this stump literally about 3 seconds after I took this picture. 

After desecrating the sacred burial grounds with our d-baggery, we moved on to Millie’s for some pre-dinner ice cream because WE DO WHAT WE WANT. 

I know some of you will be all EW GROSS YUCK BLAH but one of the current flavors is prune and I was so close to getting it but instead I opted for fig and my bae, my #1, my ride-or-die: dat lavender doe. 

Millie’s is arguably (and you know I love to argue so come at me)  the best ice cream in Pittsburgh (Maya, when you guys come here, we’re going!) and as such, this is the best lavender I’ve ever had. 

Hands down.

Oh my god, Millie’s. I can’t believe I was ever sad that they took over the space of my former favorite ice cream place’s shop—Oh Yeah. 

Their ice cream is just so refreshing!

Henry was mad because every person in line had to try a sample and why couldn’t they just know what they wanted to order, like he did??

(He got peppermint brownie and butter pecan, not like anyone cares.)

Chooch usually always gets Chad’s Favorite Vanilla and The Best Chocolate, but this time he shocked us all by forgoing the chocolate in favor of the peppermint brownie. Wow.

Then we did some shopping. I hate shopping that was whatever. But apparently there is a new version of the Babysitters Club books out?! They’re graphic novels though which doesn’t please me, but Chooch wants to start reading them because all his GIRLFRIENDS read them so I relented and let him get the first one even these newfangled, flashy versions of them make my heart ache. I LOVED THE BABYSITTERS CLUB. 

MY DAD THREW THEM ALL AWAY. 

I HAD EVERY SINGLE ONE!

(Even the special vacation ones and the Junior series.)

“Oooh, the truth about Stacey?!” Chooch cried with faux-excitement. 

“Yeah, she has diabetes.”

“Oh thanks for the spoiler!” Chooch mumbled. LOLOLOL. 

And here’s my current favorite Kpop song that Henry hates. 

EVERYBODY SAY NO. 

I needed something mindless to do before bed, so a train-of-thought blog post, it is! 

It’s been A Day, to say the least. But I made it through without cracking any gin bottles over my head, somehow. And now it’s over and we’re halfway done with the week! Together, we can do it!

But first, let’s unwind with some old-school BIGBANG with G-Dragon looking perfect as usual:

Whenever I’m feeling really overwhelmed, I think to myself, “What would G-Dragon do?” and then I realize the answer is probably is in Korean so it’s a good thing I’m learning. (I can read some of his hashtags now on Instagram!!)

Speaking of learning Korean, I was watching a YouTube video about what goes into choosing Korean names and how there are actually naming centers where names can be bought. So I was imaging how wonderful it would be to have my own Korean name. I told Glenn at work that the other day that I could have one chosen for me based on my personality. 

“So it could be—”

“Weirdo?” Glenn cut me off just as I was saying, “Beautiful Unicorn.”

I actually did learn that “weirdo” is 이상한 사람 and is NOT NICE. 

I want to go rollerskating this weekend, and I want Henry to plant flowers in the front yard, and I want to have penpals again.

The cats go on the back porch now. It’s whatever. My plants will be dead soon. 

The other night, I couldn’t sleep because I accidentally imagined Henry at his high school prom, requesting some random Captain & Tenille banger so then I couldn’t stop uproariously laughing, like full-blown belly laughs, until henry told me to go fuck myself and fell asleep, which I continued to flounder in that frustrating state of manic giddiness. ALL ALONE. 

It’s all fun and games until I laugh myself to death (which Henry might have a hand in).

I found this old picture of my friend Shawn and I drinking WINE COOLERS in 1998 because we were SO COOL. Some things to note: 

• that was one of my favorite shirts in the whole world and I only recently parted ways with it because it had a hole in it and you know, it was 20 years old, so. 
• I still have that same birdhouse hanging up next to my front door, only it’s super battered now from all the times it’s fallen. It actually used to be on the windowsill for years and that was how Kara knew which house was mine, until I moved it onto the wall and then she had to guess which house was mine based on the amount of garbage in the front yard. #brookline
• I don’t wear purple eyeshadow HARDLY AT ALL these days. Gold has been my signature color for the last five years
• I might wear my hair like that tomorrow. 
• I have a vague recollection of this night and I think that things got REALLY AWKWARD when my neighbor Abdul came over later and wouldn’t leave. 

Now in addition to doing my hair like that tomorrow, I also really want to have a throwback party with winecoolers. Are you in or are you way too cool for such corny celebrations. 

I just suddenly got a craving for apple juice though so maybe this party will have juice boxes instead. We can throw it all the way back to kindergarten. 

*****

And now, a riddle from Chooch:  What’s brown, has a head, a tail, but no legs? (Answer in the comments.)

[Ed.note: I guessed a snake, which I feel like could be a legit answer but Chooch says no.]

Chooch didn’t have piano lessons on Sunday so we went for a FAMILY WALK in Allegheny Cemetery, and it made me realize that it’s kind of been a minute since we all slowed down and actually spent some real time together (as in: no TV/phones/computer). Chooch and I were in rare form, the kind of form where EVERY DAMN THING is hilar. And Henry was just like “Shhhh, I’m trying to listen to nature.”

Speaking of, there was a bird call that he couldn’t identify! Chooch and I were appalled. We thought he knew it all.

Henry walks alone. 

One shot family photo.

It was such a good walk!

Then we went to one of the Asian markets and I was going to translate a bottle of juice for Chooch but then a group of people surged through the door and I got supreme stagefright. I bought some new candy for work and struck gold this time! More on that later. Maybe. If you want a good old-fashioned candy review blog post, that is.

But yeah, my Korean studies are going well. It’s not easy at all, but the challenge is just what I needed.

Lol, then henry and I fought because I snuck all kinds of candy in the cart at the Asian market but then he still made me 김밥 for dinner so I win. 

Also in weekend news:

• HAVE YOU MET TED?: We got new neighbors! They are very un-Boots-y and I hope it stays that way. I think it’s just the two of them: an older couple, maybe a bit older than me, or in their 40s. I only met the guy so far. His name is Ted and he seems fine. I was like CHOOCH LET’S GO MEET THIS GUY BC I NEED TO KNOW NOW IF WE SHOULD EITHER MOVE OR JUST BURN DOWN THE WHOLE HOUSE.
• PLAIN DOORS: I noticed that our new neighbors got a new front door, probably because of Boots’ actual boots, but then Henry pointed out that no, the door had just been RESTAINED. “Can we do that too?!” I cried, because I want a fresh fucking door. Henry said yes and I screamed, “CAN WE STAIN IT PURPLE?!?!” and he said no. :(
• BABIES: Babies were here on Saturday, but you knew that!
• RUNNING MAN: You guys, this is the best show in the world and it’s how Henry and I have mutual laughter while watching it. Running Man is bringing us closer together! The day we play kai bai bo to decide our marital fate is when I’ll know it’s real.
• BONDING OVER NEVER SHOUT NEVER: Chooch and I capped off a lovely weekend by seeing Never Shout Never at StageAE and I’m sure I’ll splay out 1,000+ words about that later this week. 

Until then, 안영!

Robbie and Nikki brought the twins to our house tonight for a visit and it was so much fun!

Blake and Haley came over for Babyfest too and watching them interact with their nephews made me even more excited for their baby to get here! I might not like holding babies (I’m terrified!) but I love observing them and the weird faces they make. 

Blake and Eli. 

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The ambush <3

Judy and Levi. 

We had Kpop videos on in the background the whole time so maybe they learned some Korean while they were here.  YOU DONT KNOW. Babies have weird brains. 

Chooch was being SO CLINGY and high maintenance all night because god forbid he wasn’t getting attention. But the. He lured Robbie over to the computer to watch him play some dumb game and that seemed to appease him. 

Henry and Levi. 

Judy and Eli. She was just besides herself with joy tonight and it was amazing. Almost as amazing as when she saw a picture of G-Dragon on my phone and thought it was Chooch. I WISH. 

I love that we see both of Henry’s kids so much now! And being around these cute babies makes me want to adopt. Probably not right now though.  I’m pretty poor. 

The weekend was only three days ago and I already forget most of it.  I think it was mostly an OK one though! Saturday, we did that thing at Chooch’s school which I already told you about, Dear Diary. 

Then later that night we met up with Chronica at Bruster’s for some Is Cram, which is Chooch-speak for Ice cream. Now you’ll be able to communicate with him if you ever come to life, my make-believe friends. 

Over ice cream, Monica randomly* mentioned that when Chris started working  at the law firm, she would come home and tell Monica about the cool girl there that she wanted to be friends with and GUESS WHO SHE WAS TALKING ABOUT? 

ME, BITCHES!

*(Probably not actually random. I’m sure there was a natural segueway into this and not Monica screaming, “I CANT KEEP THIS TO MYSELF ANY LONGER!”)

That made me happy because I used to do the same thing except I was coming home and telling Henry, who probably cared less than Monica. I think the moment I knew that we were destined to be friend was when she overheard me tell Boss Amber that it was Weird Fruit Salad time and she asked me what kind of weird fruit I had. 

“Cherimoya,” I said. And then Chris relied, “I love cherimoya!” It turns out she used to eat it when she lived in Spain! 

I can totally see Todd going home and telling all of his friends about the awesome broad at work who busts everyone’s tastebuds with the dangerous foreign candy she brings in, and how desperately he wants to be friends with her. 

(I couldn’t even type that with a straight face.)

Anyway, WOW what an amazing segue into Sunday, which found us walking into the heart of Brookline. When you think about it, Brookline is kind of a miniature Epcot. You’ve got the Greek restaurant, a billion pizza places, an African market, a Vietnamese nail salon, a Chinese restaurant, and the two places on our Sunday itinerary: the Mexian market and Pitaland. 

So yeah, EXACTLY like Epcot, without the big silver ball thing and filled with Yinzers. 

(I haven’t been to Epcot since 1990 so if you’ve never believed me before, don’t start now.)

I specifically wanted to go to the Mexican market for some fresh candy flavors, which I will tell you about in painstaking detail at a later date.

A quick stop at Pitaland afterward for olives and, well, pita. I felt like I was cheating on Korea and that made me sad. That’s how I know this is real. I never feel sad when I’m cheating on Henry. 

KIDDING. 

I always feel sad when I cheat on him. 

KIDDING. 

I don’t cheat on him. 

Anymore. 

Lol. 

Oh! And Chooch’s Secret Friend came out of hibernation and sent him a postcard, just because! That’s a thing that happened on Saturday but I don’t feel like moving this to the beginning. 

Later that day, Henry came home from “the store” and found me sitting on the kitchen floor, reading a box. This seemed to concern him so I had to explain that there was Hangul on it and I was trying to sound it out. 

The one Asian market we go to reuses boxes instead of bagging things, but usually the boxes are for Chinese products. I was really excited that this box was in Korean! It was a big box that bulk noodles came in, in case you were wondering. 

Which brings us to the next weekend item: the bibim naengmyeun that Henry made me for dinner on Sunday! He said I must be getting immune to spicy food because he had already put two heaping sooonfuls of gochujang in it, plus gochugaru, but I said I could barely taste it so he had to put another spoonful in it, but not without sighing gravely. 

It was a great dinner, followed by an episode of Running Man*, putting the perfect cap on a great weekend. Henry did pretty much everything I told him to and that’s all it takes for a weekend to be great in my book. 

*(I feel like I’m almost as obsessed with this as I was with the CLASSIC Dan Tanna series “Vega$” when I was in 11th grade and tried to make all my friends watch it but they were like naw I’m good.)

And thanks to my k-diet, I’m officially at my lowest weight since probably 2004, and I feel so accomplished! 

So when I’m feeling totally emo tomorrow (the one year anniversary of finding my aunt Sharon half-conscious on the floor of my Pappap’s house, which snowballed into the most nightmarish year of my life) and the next day (the two-year anniversary of Marcy’s death), I’ll go back and read some of my weekend recaps while fighting off the Return of the Doom & Gloom.  I’m gonna needs lots of good thoughts and Kpop aerobics to get me through.  하이팅!

Chooch’s Instagram account is linked to mine because that kid breaks every phone he gets so whenever he wants to post or check out his feed, he has to do it on my phone. The downside to this, for me, is that when his friends get particularly chatty, my phone blows up with notifications. Last night, it was because Chooch is part of a group chat on Instagram with kids from school, & this is how I found out that David Bitchfucker (I wanted to include his full name but Henry was like ERIN!) planned on fighting Chooch’s buddy (we’ll call him….Jerry) today!!!

I got really upset about this because I like Jerry. He comes over every morning to retrieve Chooch and makes sure he gets to school in one piece, and you know, has his shoes on or whatever.

Things I should be doing.

Plus, dude is polite as shit and calls me MISS KELLY and not MRS ROBBINS which is false.

Anyway, I talked to Chooch about it this morning and he was all, “It’s not going to happen. Jerry doesn’t even care” etc etc.

So I was like OK IF JERRY DOESNT CARE THEN I DONT CARE.

But then today at 4, the group message started blowing up again and this time it was because David Fuckercunt posted a video of him and Jerry fighting after school!!!

I got really upset and made Todd watch it (he’s Team Jerry too) and first he was like, “This isn’t too bad—-oh, shit. Damn! These kids are in fifth grade?!” And then I watched it and it wasn’t like totally barbaric—no blood or whatnot—but it still wasn’t pleasant and I got really upset, especially when I scrolled through Chooch’s feed and saw that some other kids were posting the video, like “oh my man David Twatflicker is litAF” — uh no he’s not, he’s a stupid little prick kid who probably has negligent parents because he also posted a video of himself blowing smoke out of his mouth.

OK MOTHERFUCKER, YOURE 10. GO CLIMB A FUCKING MONKEY BAR.

And this bitch-kid is all, “Yeah I whooped his ass” and I’m like “No, you knocked him over with your chunky body, sat on his chest, and slapped him in the face with the sleeves of your pink hoodie, you fucking knob.”

By the time henry picked me up, I was ENRAGED. I wanted to DO SOMETHING.

My first plan was that I was going to beat him up.

“No, I’ll just cyber bully him.”

Henry frowned.

“NO ILL FIND HIS PARENTS. I WILL GO TALK TO THIS DELINQUENT’S PARENTS AND TELL THEM THEYRE DOING A HORRIBLE JOB AND THAT THEIR KID IS A PIECE OF SHIT.”

“Yeah, that’s a great idea. You’d get so fired up you wouldn’t be able to say anything and then you’d end up hitting someone. And then it would be you in a video on Instagram.”

OH OK VOICE OF REASON.

You will be pleased to know that I reported the video from every one of my accounts (I have so many IG accounts, it’s almost like the LiveJournal days) and IG removed it!

A small victory.

Next, I considered showing the video to the principal (it’s still available in the private group chat that Chooch is a part of) but then Jerry will get in trouble too because that’s how shit works, and I don’t even know if Jerry wants me to get involved. OH WHAT TO DO.

Henry keeps telling me to “stay out of it” and attempted to lock my phone up in a safe when I was going to comment on some other asshole’s IG account who posted the video with the caption “My man!”

My comment was going to be, “DOESNT LOOK LIKE A MAN TO ME.”

And also “YOU FUCKING DICKHEAD.”

It’s hard to remember that these kids are in fifth grade when they’re parading around town like little cracker-thugs!!!

YOU DONT KNOW WHAT IT EVEN MEANS TO BE LIT AF!!!!!! YOU ARE IN ELEMENTARY SCHOOL, ASKING FOR PERMISSION TO TAKE A PISS, IDIOT.

It just so happens that Henry and I will be at the school tomorrow morning anyway because Chooch’s class is doing some dance thing? I have no idea what I’m going to be watching but I think I heard Chooch toss around the word POLKA. So I’m going to hone in on David FutureDropOut and proceed to intimidate him with my MENACING GLARE.

Oh and my favorite part of all this is that yesterday he posted some lame picture about loving God.  YEAH WELL GOD DOESNT LOVE YOU, DAVID DUMPSTEROFNEEDLES.

I can’t tell if this is my MOM POWER coming out or just the standard ERIN RAGE, but I’m dwelling. That much I know.

Why can’t these kids just settle their shit with a civilized game of kai bai bo?!

One of the best things about Boots destroying the other side of our duplex is that it inspired the landlord to finally, after so many years I lost count, fix our backporch. The roof had basically collapsed, making that space completely unusable, and I used to use it a lot back in the day! 

So the landlord had the contractor guys redo the entire thing for us while they were next door fixing up the disaster Boots left over there. DAEBAK!!

(I peeked in the front window and it looks REALLY nice so I’m hoping he raised the rent and some non-lowlife moves in.)

We spent the weekend adding a little flair to the space. Henry is going to paint the floor but said he waits for it to be warmer because….and I quit listening. So I threw down the Devil rug for the time being. And we have no furniture out there other than a wheelchair so if you come over, bring a tuffet, Little Miss Muffet. 

(That just brought back a horrible memory of the time we were playing Scattergories at game and the category was furniture. My answer was tuffet and everyone tried to veto it! IM SORRY BUT IF THAT MUFFET BITCH SAT ON IT, IT COUNTS.)

The fact that I said “I want to get lights for the porch” and Henry not only bought lights but HUNG THEM on the same day is ground-breaking. He either really loves me or is just officially on auto-pilot. 

While we were at Target on Saturday in search of them, we spotted someone we knew and didn’t feel like talking so we did the whole “hiding in the toy aisle” thing. I was like, “Man thank god Chooch isn’t here, his big mouth would totally give us away. ‘WHAT? WHERE? WHO ARE YOU HIDING FROM? HER? HIM?'” 

Ugh, kids, amirite. 

However, I texted my mom and told her what was going on because THIS IS WHERE I GET IT FROM. I remember hiding in the attic with her when I was in elementary school because someone from the PTA was knocking on our door with a bunch of shit they wanted my mom to type. 

And people wonder why I run when the pizza guy comes a’knocking. 

Anyway, a few minutes pass and then I hear some Target boy come on the intercom, saying, “Would Erin Kelly please report to her car?” And he releated it THREE TIMES. 

“I can’t believe my mom did that!” I laughed incredulously. 

“I can,” Henry smirked. 

When I told Octavia, she said, “That sounds like something you would do to Chooch!” And I guess we all know where I get it.

The cats are terrified of the HORRIFIC porch and refuse to go out there, so my plants are safe for now. 

Henry let me paint some bricks! He knew it would keep me quiet. While I was painting, I had a flashback to a time in high school when some guy (pick one) called me weird and whatever teacher quickly interrupted and said, “She’s not weird! Erin is, um, artistic.”

OK, but I identify more with weird and have never been offended by it. Do you know how many times I’m called weird at work?! It’s fine. 

Octavia sent me this beautiful European circus posters years ago and I was saving them until I found a grand way to display them, but this will do for now. It’s time for them to get some spotlight!

Originally, I thought the wood paneling was tacky, but now it’s growing on me. I feel like the theme to All in the Family should be playing quietly in the background every time someone walks out there. Needs more burnt orange and burgundy. 

(Also, it’s better than the PARTICLE BOARD that used to be out there omg.)

I’m going to add some more pumpkins at varying lengths.  I’m also looking for one of those big plastic light-up Santas, because I want this room to have a loose holiday theme. 

The floor is blah right now and henry has rejected my idea for glittered epoxy so we’ll see how this pans out as time goes on. But even just at this stage, every time I step out the door, I’m like 아싸!

I’m really excited. This is like a blank canvas for me and I can’t wait to Pollock the FUCK out of that bitch. 

I think that Henry was hoping we would just go back and sit in the car for a few hours to kill time after the whole succulent show clusterfuck went down, maybe do a crossword puzzle or some other equally frugal activity. Because in Henry’s eyes, he saw our refusal into the succulent show as a major money saver. But then the rest of us made the unanimous decision to walk across the street to the Museum of Natural History instead and Henry had cash register sounds wafting from his ears and nostrils.

Oh lighten up, Hank!

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Passed this fat squirrel on the walk there and I could have just spent the afternoon with him, if we’re being honest. I LOVE SQUIRRELS. Except for the time I was at the cemetery and walked into a squirrel convention—-there were HUNDREDS of them perched in every tree and they ogled me intently as I nervously walked by and prayed that they wouldn’t launch an attack. I’m not here to steal your fucking nuts, I promise!

Inside the wonderfully non-crowded museum (because everyone was at the Botanical Gardens, apparently!), Blake and Haley convinced us to add on a ticket to one of the planetarium shows and I was all, “Yeah sure, that sounds great!” even though it was about JUPITER and I am terrified of outer space. You should have seen me when I was forced by my advisor at Pitt to take a dumb class on the planets. I was nauseous in every class and had awful nightmares. It was way scarier than the class I took on Vampires!

I had a flashback to the time I was pregnant and Henry and I went to COSI in Columbus to meet some friends and I had a red slushie and then we watched some IMAX thing on Vikings and I was like OH SHIT IT’S COMING—-no, not the baby, but the vomit. So I had to run to the bathroom and didn’t make it all the way in the stall, and just fucking SPRAYED THE WALL with puke. The slushie made it look like I was a vampire projectile vomiting some bad blood, like maybe I had tried to dine on TRUMP and realized that his blood is not that of a human, but the poisonous puss of a demon snake.

Chooch and Blake competed to see who could get the most drops of water on a penny and Blake won by one drop. The girl overseeing this bare bones science experiment asked Blake if he was being honest because she couldn’t say, “Bitch, you lyin’!” like she wanted, I guess.

The most dangerous animals look so friendly though!

We meandered about at a leisurely pace, killing time until the LIVE ANIMAL SHOW started at 1:00, which Blake dutifully noted on the sign by the entrance. He even did his due diligence by asking a museum docent where the LIVE ANIMAL SHOW was going to be held. And yet, only Henry and I were there when it started.

So Blake, Haley and Chooch missed the horrifying opening scene as the ancient animal handler started off the show by slowly counting off the animals that can be admired in the outdoor habitat. Right off the bat, he told us that there WERE two sea otters, but then one died a week prior. From there, he told us about the coyotes.

“It’s a really interesting story, how we acquired them…” and then proceeded to tell us a tale of vehicular coyote-slaughter, and how the slain coyote was PREGNANT and it just so happened that the man who killed her had his dad with him, who was A VETERINARIAN, so the dad pulls out his birthing bag from the trunk (I guess?) and proceeds to perform a C-section on the dead coyote, saving her four babies, who are then cared for at the coyote orphanage (I dunno, some place in Texas where the terrible murder of their mother occurred), and then only THREE were adopted by the museum, so they left one sibling all alone.

HEARTLESS.

Anyway, that’s how the one lone coyote at the Cleveland museum acquired three friends.

Incidentally, this is also how I started crying in the middle of the museum, surrounded by strollers and screaming kids who didn’t give a shit about a single word this old man was uttering. They just wanted to see the LIVE ANIMALS.

SAMESIES.

First, we got to see some kind of owl that looked the owl from Labyrinth but I already forget what it was. It pooped on the old man’s arm while he was holding it though. And it had the same colors as my cat Penelope.

The rest of our crew had joined us by then, just in time to hear the old man play five thousand different owl sounds on his phone. Apparently, after one particular hoot, he made some off-color  remark about it sounding like a woman being murdered, so Henry, Blake and Chooch were like, “OMG HAHAHAHAHA” and I was all, “WHAT? WHAT JUST HAPPENED” and when they told me, I felt like falling to my knees and screaming NOOOOoooo! Because of course when something exciting finally happens, I’m not paying attention.

I asked if the moms in the crowd were all gasping and clutching their chests, but Henry said that not a single person flinched.

Blake said the man mumbled it like he knew a thing or two about what a woman being murdered sounds like.

And the weird thing is that I was thinking in my head that it sounded like murder, as I mindlessly checked Instagram for G-Dragon updates, so then I wondered, “DID I MAKE THAT OLD MAN SAY THAT OUT LOUD!? DID I TRANSFER MY THOUGHTS TO HIS TONGUE?!” and now I know what my answer will be next time someone asks me what I want my superhero power to be, BECAUSE I ALREADY HAVE ONE.

Satisfied with the amount of owl noises he shared with his inattentive audience, the old man finally started talking about the next animal he would be showing us – A PORCUPINE! We were all like, “Fuck yeah, porcupine!”

But before bringing out the porcupine, we had to endure a long presentation of what the porcupine eats:

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Ugh x8!!!

The porcupine finally came out but the man had him positioned with his back to the crowd and this was the breaking point for us. so we unanimously decided to go outside to the habitat even though wet snow was falling from the heavens and we all complained about freezing, it was still better than being lulled to sleep by the old ass animal lecturer.

Then it was time for the Jupiter show in the tiny planetarium auditorium thing, and even though we arrived early like instructed, we still struggled to find seats. Finally, some broad and her son offered to move over so we could all sit together and she became the hero of the day because I didn’t want to sit alone with Henry, like we were on a date or something.

Some lady behind us was laughing so obnoxiously and kept saying JONATHAAAAAAAN and Haley muttered something about hating her and I was like OMG ME TOO. It was a real bonding moment.

And then the show started, and Henry immediately fell asleep. I’m not kidding, like IMMEDIATELY. He’s so embarrassing. Haley made it about halfway through before she finally succumbed to the zzzzz’s as well, but she’s pregnant, so.

This show was called Beneath the Veil, and it wasn’t wedding porn like Henry had hoped, but it focused on the Juno spacecraft’s mission as it orbits Juniper.

OK, I might be scared to death of outer space, and learning, and sitting in the dark with strangers, but this show was good and I enjoyed it and MAYBE it was because my heart and hormones immediately glommed on to the museum guy presenting the show (even though I couldn’t see him in the dark). I felt an instant connection with his comedic timing and lowkey Trump administration shade-throwing (“You can look at more pictures of the mission on NASA.org. That website is still available….for now.” SIC ‘EM, PLANET NERD!)

The annoying lady behind us spent the ENTIRE show loudly agreeing with the museum guy’s narration, and would grunt, “MMMM HMMMM” and “YEP” every 2 minutes and I was like, “Wow, maybe you should get up there and narrate the next one?”

For whatever reason, I was crying by the time the lights came back on. I have no idea why I get so emotional.

***********

We left right after the show, because it was finally time for MELT, and then it was time to go back home and have Chooch hound us for quarters at every rest area we stopped at, and I was like, “If I didn’t have quarters at the last one, why would I have quarters now? My pockets don’t just generate quarters” and then I spent the next 15 minutes imagining pants that build currency in the pockets, like you could just tell it, “Bake me up some won, pants. I’m in Korea and want to buy some soju” and then I started crying silently to myself because I’m just here, in dumb America.

Someone gave him quarters.

Then we got home and I realized I forgot everything we learned at the museum, except for that owl that sounded like a woman being murdered.