I’m sure if you have children, you share my pain and frustration when it comes to Halloween. I’m thankful that Chooch goes to a school that at least acknowledges that Halloween exists, but then they go and take all the fun out of it because there are so many rules and restrictions when it comes to what they’re allowed to wear and bring in for snacks. 

Anyway, Chooch’s main costume for trick or treating breaks the “NO WEAPONS” rule because it involves half a homemade arrow god forbid. So at the last minute, I decided that we might as well make use of his pink hair and build a cheap l, bare bones costume around it because  the school’s sad excuse for a Halloween party is not worth much more effort than this. 

Stupid cotton candy. 

Henry came home from work early enough to walk to the school and watch the parade with me, so he was there to witness the moment when Chooch broke my HEART by waking out with the cotton all unfluffed AND NO SIGN. 

“He looks like a half-assed clown going to a birthday party! This is STUPID. I HATE TODAY,” I cried to Henry who gave me his canned response of “Take it easy.”

And that little jerk knew he fucked up because he gave me that shit-eating grin/shrug combo and I mouthed “YOU ARE DEAD TO ME” at which point he turned back to his dumb friends and giggled his way on down the parade route while my feelings hung out to dry on a clothesline fashioned from my fragile ego. 

I stormed off with Henry casually following me like this wasn’t the worst thing in the world and he wasn’t bothered by it AT ALL. 

I’ll spare you the details, but there was also a complete tantrum thrown in the middle of an alley on the way to Cannon Coffee and then I was like IM JUST GOING HOME and got even more mad when Henry didn’t try to stop me but then we ended up going to Cannon Coffee anyway because I knew there was no coffee at home and I NEEDED IT. 

I was mostly ok after that. Although Henry just now begged me to please try to calm down for the rest of the day because apparently I’m being a bitch.

I hate Halloween. 

J/K! I still love Halloween. 

  
There is just not enough time for me to get as much done as I would like, but I am slowly plowing through my list of custom paintings. SO WHY NOT START MORE PROJECTS. It’s not like we have Halloween costumes to make or anything.  

I have a bunch of shrink plastic left over from my last failed foray into jewelry-making, so why not waste more time! I’ve been wanting to turn some of my recent people-paintings into pendants and whatever, so I gave it a trial run last night. 

Sophia Petrillo ring and my majorly chipped nails. 
  

Sexy HEY-SOOS pendant.   

These are pretty rough prototypes just to see how they hold up. So far so good, so now I’ll make some fancier ones, maybe! Probably not! I don’t do “fancy” very well. 

In the next segment of this late night Tuesday blog post, let’s look at some recent paintings I made, because this is kind of a business and I should probably try to  promote it every once in awhile. Sorry to be so annoying & in yo’ face. 

Kellin Quinn from Sleeping With Sirens.   Frank-n-Furter for Chris, a super belated birthday gift because I’m a great friend. 

But at least my wedding gift for her and Monica was on time. 

And then this one was for my work friend Jill’s sister, who is a master biker. I like when I get to paint happy scenery. 

I just finished another custom order tonight but it’s for a birthday/Xmas gift so I can’t post it yet. And today someone bought my Lizzie Borden and Log Lady paintings! I can go to more haunted houses now!

I have another day off on Friday and I really need to make new serial killer holiday cards so FINGERS CROSSED that I can get motivated. I could never be a fake artist full time. I know you’ve been wishing on falling stars for a Ted Bundy Hanukkah card. 

As always, if you’re looking for an original gift or something to cover a hole in the wall, please visit my Etsy shop: somnambulant. 

Yesterday was Chris and Monica’s wedding and it was lovely. I almost never use that word in a non-sarcastic sense, but my sentiments are real. There will be a proper post about that, believe me, but for now, here’s a picture of what my kid wore, which I made him re-wear today when I realized I didn’t get any decent photos of him wearing clothes that weren’t dirty or full of holes. 

He somehow managed to keep his shirt tucked in all night, too!

(His bow tie is actually from Spirit Halloween; he wanted it because it’s Minecraft-esque.)

We’re currently rounding out another beautiful fall weekend with a trip to the WV state pen in Moundsville for their haunted house with my sister Amy and her daughter Brooke. October weekends forever!

We did some running around Thursday evening and then Henry realized he had about 15 minutes to get food into our mouths before Chooch and I started to morph into our demonic alter egos from Famine Land, so he pulled into the El Campesino parking lot with a quickness.    

Bunch of asses. 

We had the BEST Mexican waiter, an older guy who was just a real delight, even after he had to come back FOUR times before Chooch finally settled on a taco, which is all he ever gets at Mexican restaurants anyway, so I’m not quite sure what he was trying to unearth on that menu. 

While we waited for ourfood, some Yinzer man stopped as he walked past our table to commend Chooch on reading a book—he brought in his new Dan & Phik book to read at the table; why do all of these YouTubers keep putting out books? I’m doing it wrong. EL SIGH. Anyway, this guy overstayed his welcome and it was already awkward even before he started talking to us about his ex-wife and her nocturnal reading habits. But still, it was kind of nice at the same time because kids these days need all the encouragement to stay off cell phones and tablets as they can get. BOOKS R GUD, KIDZ. Even if it’s just these idiot YouTube ones. Reading is reading. 
 

After dinner, Chooch gleefully ordered sopapillas. He’s been obsessed with sopapillas since he was about 4 or 5 I guess? It started one day when we went to King’s of all places, after roller skating, and he ordered sopapillas. I kept saying it over and over in a robust Italian accent, because why not, maybe sometimes Mario and Luigi are sick of cannoli and want a nice plate of pillowy sopapillas. You don’t know. Chooch thought this was hilarious because he’s my #1 fan (and probably also because Henry kept telling me to stop because I was being “annoying”).

So Chooch of course goes to school and starts saying “Sopapillas!” like it’s a Tourette’s tick, and some bratty girl told on him so he actually got in trouble for saying the name of a MEXICAN DESSERT. 

Catholic schools, man. 

It’s a huge joke with us now, because how goddamn ridiculous. Maybe Pontius Pilate was eating sopapillas when he condemned Jesus to the cross, who knows. But Chooch never passes up the chance to order them when we’re out. 

Our adorable waiter repeated Chooch’s order back to him and after he walked away, Chooch closed his eyes and murmured, “Ugh, I love hearing him say that. ‘Sopapillas’…..”

  
And here he is with his dumb book. My favorite book when I was his age was The Westing Game and I’m determined to make him read it. (I’m always looking for recommendations for him, so feel free to comment with your faves!)

At some point on Saturday, in between gluing sequins on my Pie Party sign and shadow dancing around Baker Henry in the kitchen, I had the greatest idea of all time. I was upstairs when it came to me, and so I screamed for Henry to hurry his ass up to our room. He loves when I do that because sometimes it’s an actual emergency just often enough for him to fall for it every time.

“What?!” he asked, panting and mildly concerned.

“Greatest idea ever,” I began, and he immediately regretted falling victim to my wolf cries. “In addition to the pie party….SUCCULENT MEET N’ GREET.” I paused for a beat, smiling and waiting for him to crumble to the floor under the weight of my brilliance.

Instead, he just stood there, arms akimbo, that patronizing smirk plastered across his dumb bearded face.

Good thing I’ve never been one to look to my BEAU for validation. Speaking of BEAU, Bo Brady probably would have supported Hope in her decision to have a succulent meet n greet.

No, you’re right. That’s definitely false. Bo thought Hope was silly and frivolous. Oh, until she was about to marry LARRY WELCH, that is.

(OMG remember when Henry was my Bo Brady?)

Later that night, we were getting ready for bed and I was still yammering on about my succulent meet n’ greet. “This is just really exciting, I’m really excited about this, and I think it’s just full of excitement, so much excite,” the words spewing out in an auctioneer’s cadence. Henry must have been delirious from baking all day and night, because he just stared at me with an amused look on his face, and that is unlike him. The looks he gives me are typically basted with disgust, contempt, and frustration. Occasionally rage, but Henry is pretty laid back so one must really give him a series of forceful shoves for the anger to really shine through.

“They’ve never gone anywhere before!” I reminded Henry.

“Well, they’re plants, so….” he muttered.

Sunday morning, while Henry was filling the car with unnecessary, boring items like forks and plates, I was carefully considering which of my succulents to bring with us. I couldn’t bring some of my faves, like Bae and Panne and Suzy Banyon, because their pots are too fragile and breakable.

“I really want to bring Johnny Maplebitch with us, but I’m worried because there will be kids there…” I murmured mostly to myself, staring at that beautiful beast on my coffee table.

“Well, you could change his name for the day,” Chooch suggested. “Like, maybe….Johnny Mapledick?” he shrugged, completely serious about this.

“Yeah, good one, Chooch,” Henry sighed, stomping past us with more unessential pie party things, like pie.

I ended up bringing him in the end, because I don’t believe in succulent censorship.

I placed them all gently inside a carrying case while Henry was wasting time rounding up the beverage and making sure Chooch was dressed and not in danger. A little help would have been nice, but knowing Henry and his meathands, he probably would have just jammed my babes into the car all recklessly, like they’re not his real children.

Of course they’re not.

They’re the Devil’s.

I lined all of the picnic tables in the pavilion with craft paper and then had all of the succulents introduce themselves and say a little thing about pie. Because it was a pie party.

I TIE THINGS TOGETHER. It’s what I do.

Chris and Monica asked me what vasterbotten pie is and I shrugged. “I’unno. I just googled ‘swedish pies’ and then didn’t get much farther than that.” So then Chris googled it and actually read about vasterbotten, and now we’re obsessed with vasterbotten pie because it’s basically just cooked Swedish cheese and I hope that Chris and Monica are currently reorganizing their wedding menu as I type this.

Henry always rolls his eyes when I bring up Phil Angie.

Leopold is the succulent I found in Savannah! I brought him so it was like having Octavia there in spirit. <3

And I had to bring Stefano so Monica could meet him in person, since she is the one who named him. (Also, two Days of Our Lives references in one blog post! And I haven’t even watched Days since 2005! <—sadly.)

Bambi had to give a shout-out to her favorite show, Twin Peaks. HOLLA.

I named this one after my favorite gymnastics coach of all time, BELA KAROLYI. He was happy to bring some Romanian flavor to the party. Isn’t he handsome?

Henry frowned at this one.

Some people seemed very eager to meet the succulents! Other people were like, “Why.” Henry was like, “This is why you don’t have friends.”

Anyway, if you couldn’t be there on Sunday, I hope you enjoyed this virtual meet and greet!

   
Today is the pie party and our streak of perfect fall weather while gorging on filled pastries is holding strong! It is absolutely gorgeous today and I can’t wait to see everyone (and their pies)!

Currently I’m taking some time to decompress in the cemetery while Chooch is down the street at piano and Henry is at home probably staring at a wall and drooling. He baked his ass off yesterday and probably wishes he was “napping” in this beautiful sleep shack right now:

 Hope everyone has a wonderful Sunday and I will have a bite of pie for each of my far away friends who can’t be here today!

   
(I should have held the pie party in the cemetery. I’m an idiot.)

 Now if you’ll excuse me? I have some geese to mock and a unicyclist to gawk at. 

Ghoul Mansion

Have you ever been to Ghoul Mansion? Well It wasn’t TOO scary. Well on the way there I fell asleep and while I was sleeping daddy went in Barnes and Noble to get a “My Drunk Kitchen”  book made by Hannah Hart.

Daddy was “scrub” so he didn’t want to go in. There was a maze where there were guys with glow in the dark gloves on. It was also pitch black. We got into a Nurse part (WHICH ALWAYS THE WORSE) and me and mommy got our pictures taken. The first picture was normal. The second picture had a loud BANG when it was shot. Oh yeah and a couple doors down there was a bar and grill called Marigold Bar and Grill. Daddy said that was where he was going to while we were in the haunted house.

When we were leaving mommy was a “scrub” for running away from a kid dressed up as a devil. LOL (,:! She was so annoyed.

After the haunted house we stopped at this diner called MIDDLESEX Diner. LOLOLOLOLOLOL! Before the MIDDLESEX Diner we drove past MIDDLESEX BAR AND GRILL. I had a HUGE cheeseburger that I made daddy eat and the bathroom smelled like piss. I was sad because Yankee Kitchen (The diner we went to before) because daddy didn’t want to go so we didn’t get to hear Fish Dinner! ):

While we were there an old guy sneezed louder than daddy, LOUDER THAN DADDY! I mean who sneezes louder than daddy, right?!?!

CASTLE BLOOD

Janna, Daddy, Mommy, Kara, and I went to Castle blood the day after me and mommy went to Ghoul mansion. I made fun of Janna by saying “Are you sure your mom isn’t going to whoop your a**?” She said back “No, only on Christmas.” I found a hand buzzer in the parking lot and Kara took it and I said “Don’t Taze Me Bro!”  One of the guys at Castle Blood called daddy “BIG MAN.” We all laughed but daddy agreed with the guy.

It was Kara’s first time at Castle Blood and she liked it. We go every year because its awesome and we just like haunted houses a lot. It used to be an old funeral home and there are a lot of ghosts there now. I was nervous because I had to go in the front a lot. If someone asked me why they should go to castle blood I would say because its AWESOME and always has a good story. I would tell you what the story is but you should go find out for your self.

We were looking for 3 things a Stone, a Bone, and a Crumb. Wait umm sorry, a Crone. Well that was embarrassing. Some vampire guy made me go up the stairs without the group so I did, and I got to scare the crap out of mommy. But not anyone else because I’m bad at scaring people.

At the grave yard part Whiplash (one of the people) said “Don’t drop the stone.” and right after that it sounded like I dropped it but I kicked a nail. SO QUIT MAKING FUN OF ME!

A Werewolf jump-scared us and made us all howl. I did the best and daddy did the worst because he didn’t do it.

Obviously you know I had fun at two haunted houses on Saturday and Sunday. 
 

Hi blog-diary thing. I need you to be there for me right now. I already ranted about this on Facebook, but now I am feeling more things and need to enjoy the glorious release of typing it out. 

One of our weirdo neighbors was waiting for us to come home from work, on his bicycle no less, and immediately confronted Chooch about stealing his paintball gun and some Pokemon thing that is like, collectors edition? Both of these things he kept in his garage which is always opened. (And as Blake said: lock your shit up! This is the city not a farm.) Anyway, Chooch was all blindsided and was like “what I didn’t do it” and basically we all know it was some asshole down the street and the accusatory neighbor knows it too but since Chooch is the oldest out of the neighborhood kids, this is automatically his cross to bear?

Yeah no.

You know who else was blindsided? Me. It took me a while to figure out what was going on because I was in my After Work Hunger Famine stage that happens everyday from 5:30 – whenever Henry chucks some dinner at my face. I was just trying to cross the street to get to food, not pay attention to some middle-aged bully straddling his bicycle and interrogating my kid. Ok, tough guy. 

Anyway, we got the douchebag neighbor off our back and onto the other kid’s back (and that kids mom wa a screaming at him because she knows her son is a thieving cooze too) so you would think that all was well. But no. Because I say here and stewed all evening. Hours later, I snapped. My snarling bitch fest went something like this: 

“Henry, this is fucked up. I’m PISSED. I just want to come the fuck home from work and eat the dinner that you’re going to cook for me, not be accosted by some rando neighbor on his lame ass bike for god knows what?! YEARS I lived here in peace and harmony, never having to deal with a fucking neighbor, and then we had to go and have a KID and now this?! Fuck these people! This is why I don’t go outside! CHOOCH SHOULD JUST STAY INSIDE TOO. WE CAN ALL STAY INSIDE TOGETHER. LETS GET WORK-FROM-HOME JOBS AND NEVER TALK TO A PERSON AGAIN.”

Henry is not on board with this. 

NEW PLAN: Henry does all the handling of the neighbors. I’ll talk to Hot Naybor Chris BUT THAT IS IT. 

The rest of them can suck my dick that they’ll never see because I’m a hermit now and also because I don’t have one. 

I liked this neighbor better when he was on house arrest and our house was out of ankle bracelet range. 

Actually I didn’t even know who he was until after I recovered from my dumbfounded stupor and asked “who the fuck was that?!” as he pedaled off into the horizon like Miss Almira Gulch.  And Henry and Chooch yelled, “LARRY!”

I came across this idiot photo of myself from a Girl Scout field trip to Triple B Farms in 1987 and that fucking bow on my dome made me laugh because basically I was a style icon to 2000’s-era scene girls everywhere. I always wore those puffy, cushiony bows back then like it was a compulsion. My mom bought them at Children’s Place and Kids R Us. It definitely brought to mind all the scene queens we used to see specifically at Chiodos shows, just a fucking sea of pastel-haired Minnie Mouse-bowed waifs flitted about on wafts of their own ennui, waiting for a chance to bat their fake gooey eyelashes at Craig Owens.   

For old time’s sake, I googled “scene girl at Chiodos show” and then laughed because the second thing that came up was a link to my blog.    God, did I have my finger on the comb-over fringe-haired pulse back then or what.  

Welcome to Oh Honestly Erin, not spell-checked since 2008.   

Then I did an image search and saw that Blake and Robbie, Henry’s sons, are in the first few pictures, so I was like “haha oh shit” and texted a screenshot to Henry, who replied with, “Yeah, keep scrolling down. Thanks, Erin.”    

 HILAR. Henrietta, the ultimate scene queen. 

Of course I ran right to Facebook with this because that’s just what I do: stroke my succulents, fuck grammar in the ass, and emasculate Henry on social media. Robbie commented on it with a succinct “haha” to which Henry replied, “Don’t laugh to [sic] hard. Your picture comes up also.”

Yeah but at least there’s an actual girl in the picture with Robbie.

Henry can try to fight it all he wants but he IS A PART OF THE SCENE. 

As a Friday night bonus, here is a picture of him frowning at his first Chiodos show in 2008.     

GOODNIGHT, GANG. 
  
 
 

As if you don’t know by now what Henry looks like at his most irritated and put-upon, here are a series of Henry bombs (I lied—some are straight-on shots that he knew about and was probably saying STOP as I was taking them). I haven’t done a Henry Bombs post in awhile because like everything else in my life, I lost interest.   

The “Day One, Band One, WTF am I Watching Right Now?” shot. This was during Into It. Over It. I thought they were lovely. Henry thought, well, his face says it all. 
  

The “Maybe If I Look For Ted Nugent on the Band Lineup For The 3rd Time, He’ll Show Up” shot. 

The “Professionally Giving Some French Broad Directions In The Fancy Econo Lodge Parking Lot & Then Spent the Rest of the Day Imagining Her French Kissing Me As Payment” shot. 

   
 The “I’ve Had A Lot Of Beers, Can’t Maintain The Frown, Whatever Band This Is Sucks But I Can’t Get My Face To Reflect That Sentiment! FROWWWWWN COMMMMMME BAAAAACK!” shot. 

The “Just Chillin’ With The Homie Yelawolf; He Probably Hates Manchester Orchestra, Too” shot. 
  

The “When Manchester Orchestra Is So Boring, I Make Origami With My Empty Beer Cup & That’s When I Know It’s Time For Another” shot. 

The “Hey I’m Gonna Get Another Beer Before I Finish This One So I Can Doublefist My Way To Oblivion While You Watch This Shitty Band That Sounds Like That Last Shitty Band On That Other Stage We Just Walked A Mile From & Then Maybe I’ll Buy a Beanie From the Stheart Booth So That I’ll Look More Like One Of Those Post Hardcore Boys You Like So Much” shot. 
  

The “Calculating How Much Beer Money Will I Have Left If I Pay Someone From the Hellzapoppin’ Circus to Set My Ears On Fire So I Don’t Have To Listen To Snoop Dogg Tonight” shot. 

The “Quick Gimme a Mirror, ‘Bloody Nugent, Bloody Nugent, Bloody Nugent'” shot. 
  

The “Nope, Nothing Sounds Better While Sitting” shot. 

The “Having My Head Adjusted After Going Hard In the Thrice Pit; Just Kidding, It’s Only My Afternoon Grooming” shot. 
 

The “Do We Really Need To Stand So Close For Every Time I Die? I Feel Very Unsafe” shot. 

  The “I Bet If I Had a Car This Bitchin’ IRL, I Could Bag a Woman More My Speed, Someone Who’d Be Content With Watching a Cheap Trick Cover Band At The Corner Bar Once a Year” shot. 

The “Thinking Of All the NCIS Marathoning I Could Be Doing This Weekend, But Instead I Had To Put On Pants Just to Have My Ears and Wallet Violated” shot. 

The “Shoulda Stayed in THE SERVICE” shot. 

The “I Hope She Spills That Fucking Coffee, McDonald’s-style” shot. 

The “FIRST IN LINE FOR MORNING BEER!!!!” shot. 
 The “Oh Ho, We’re Not Friends, Please Find A New Boyfriend Before We Go Home Today—Wait, WE STILL HAVE ANOTHER DAY?!” shot. 

Well, we just went to get breakfast at the FANTASTIC Econo Lodge ($69 a night, friends!) only to see some girl in her early 20s, wearing unstrapped overalls and a tube top thing (are we still calling them tube tops in 2015, or has Urban Outfitters given them a more hipster-approved title? Like Uberband? Post-tube? Totesbandeau? Rackshizz? Lena Dunham’s Boob Thong?), standing near the food with some older lady who was saying, “This is not right, this is a food area” and then the girl said, “I need help” and the lady said, “THEN I WILL CALL THE POLICE” and I noticed the younger girl was holding a clump of hair and looked like she was probably high on meth. 

I mumbled, “Oh. Nope,” and Henry and I spun on our heels in tandem and came back to the room. 

That being said, IT’S LIVEBLOGGING TIME. Just a warning: my phone LOVES to autocorrect my blog posts when I’m not looking so I can’t be held responsible for any ludicrous typos. Just the normal ones. You know how bad I am at GRAMMAR. (Seriously. I forgot the “at” in that last sentence at first. I am so good.)

8:00am: Henry just came back in from taking HIS stuff (and not mine?!) out to the car and said now the girl is sitting out there, eating a muffin, and all of her stuff is in garbage bags. 

8:05am: We just checked out and that girl was sitting in the lobby going round and round with the front desk clerk, who I think now might be her SISTER?! She was like DONT WALK AWAY FROM ME! and the older lady was like I HAVE CUSTOMERS! (OMG me and Henry are now a part of this story because WE WERE THE CUSTOMERS so now, years from now, when they tell this story around the fire on Christmas Eve, when they get to the CUSTOMERS part, I hope they describe me as “That young Jennifer Anoston-looking sweetheart” and Henry will probably be “and her old, grizzled captor.” 

That girl totally lives there though. 

8:41am: We’re on the road now and I’m nostalgically playing Riot Fest music for Henry who is unenthused and just yelled at me for not helping him get change for the toll booth, to which I countered, “Yeah well, I don’t have my sunglasses!” (?) Henry said, “That’s not my fault. I can’t be in charge of your sunglasses when I’m already in chafe of everything else. Like, your tampons.” Haha it’s true. 

But really: Alexisonfire and Beach Slang up in here right now. 

9:36am: Henry just flipped out because the toll booth lane we were in had a malfunctioning ticket thing and he pulled over and left me in the car (DANGEROUS) so he could be a good professional driver by skipping off to the highway office thing and reporting the broken machine. Also, because he needed to get a ticket, I guess. He just came back to the car and exhaled deeply, like he’s so winded from being a turnpike kiss ass. 

10:13am: Welp. Just took a detour to LaPorte, Indiana’s historical society because they have the wheelbarrow that a mass husband killer used to cart away their bodies. But…they’re closed on Mondays. Henry just threw a royal bitch fit as I quietly whispered “sorry” and then proceeded to crack up. But hey, LaPorte is kind of pretty, isn’t it Henry? Kind of? No?

   
 
 LAPORTE, represent. 

10:46am: twenty minutes into Set Your Goals, Henry casually asked, “Is this the little guy and the big guy?” AW HE REMEMBERED! And the big guy was actually just regular-sized, but the little guy was so little that he made the other guy look big. I forgot how much I loved this band! I went nuts over them during the summer of 2009 and made Alisha go to their sold out show at Mr.Small’s on my birthday. It was a total sausage party and some fat guy shook his sweat all over Alisha and she did that thing where she tries to murder me with her Fairuza Balk eyes. 

11:52am: PS I think we crossed the time change line thing. 

12:13pm: At a rest stop near South Bend and a bunch of Riot Fest travelers were there too and now I feel homesick for Douglas Park. (THAT IS WHERE RIOT FEST WAS, OK?!)

12:43pm: I just had a huge epiphany.   I was just telling Henry stories from when I had to take Home Ec in middle school, and how much of a disaster I was. “I’m not surprised,” he mumbled. It was because we were talking about buying a sewing machine for a project we want to do (“we” lol) and it made me think about when I had to make these boxer-type shorts and mine should have been so cute because I had CANDY CORN fabric but instead they just came out looking wrecked. As I was telling Henry this story, I was overcome with a sense of doom and these repressed memories of home ec misery came flooding back to me. I forgot how much I disliked the teacher and how panicked she made me feel, especially during the cooking portions of the classes. I would get sick to my stomach on home ec days. Is it any wonder I rejected domesticity?!

1:55pm: just left the Four Season family restaurant in Montpelier, Ohio and I was so happy to finally sit down for a meal after three days of eating while standing in the middle of thousands of people. Henry ordered lemon rice soup becausethe hipsters on Yelp told him to. He said it was great but it was made with chicken broth so I couldn’t form my own opinion on this matter. 

   
 I ordered the Four Seasons omelette which was basically a Greek omelette and HUGE — I was so excited until I took a gigantic bite because I’m so fat and IT WAS LOADED WITH CHICKEN. I don’t know how I missed that on the menu. Luckily the pieces were giant and easily pick-outtable. I could only eat about a third anyway and then Papa Pig swooped in and ate the rest. I messaged a picture to Chooch and he was like “haha figures.” Now Henry is ranting about how he’s fat because Chooch and I never finish our food and apparently we hold a gun to his head and force him to eat it for us. 

Meanwhile, I paid 50 cents for a copy of Frank Talk to read at the table so I wouldn’t have to talk to Henry. My new life goal is to get something printed in a future issue.   

WHAT IF HENRY AND I HAD OUR OWN MAGAZINE? Wait….I guess that’s just my blog. Maybe I should start charging for subscriptions! Jim & Pat seem to have a real racket going on. 

(Just kidding-I’d never charge anyone to read my typo-laden bullshit!)

3:24pm: IM BACK. I was getting car sick SUE ME. I spent the last hour regaling Henry with stories of Erin the Yo Girl because seeing SNOOP DOGG last night really reactivated that dormant gene. I was telling him about seeing Bone and Biggie back in the day and he’s sneering at me in a way that makes me feel like he’s maybe relieved he didn’t know me then. Especially when I got to the part about lining my lips and wearing almost-brown lipstick. That’s how we did it back in the mid-90s OK?!

4:26pm: You know I’m in a hurry to get home to Chooch when I eschew the Roadside America temptation. CHOOCH I MISS YOUUUUUU. We’ve been messaging and video-chatting via Facebook all weekend so that’s been super helpful. We’re never away from each other for more than a day because we’re REALLY ATTACHED TO EACH OTHER OK. Also I just pretended to shoot Henry in the face at the end of Mr. Bill Collector and he was not pleased. YOUR RENT’S DUE MOTHERFUCKER.  

5:12pm: Chooch just facetimed me and I got to watch him eating pierogies so there’s that. 

6:40pm: Well, Most Boring Liveblog Ever, I’m about to be home in 5 minutes! Would have updated more but my WordPress app is lagging big time and all I have been doing anyway is talking with Henry about music for 8 hours and you guys don’t care about that shit. HENRY sure doesnt! KBYE!

****

EDITED TO ADD: So on the way home, Henry was like ” I dunno why you keep whining about missing Chooch because you know you guys will be fighting within 2 minutes, so….”

Came home and Chooch came prancing across the street to meet us in the parking lot (yes, he looked both ways—Henry taught him how to cross the street unjackassedly) and after hugging each other and squealing, we immediately started arguing about whether it was a stick or dog poop that Chooch nearly stepped on in the grass. 

“Thirty seconds,” Henry mumbled. 

Seriously though it was fossilized poop!

(OMFG I missed Chooch so much. He was so excited to see us and even gave us weird nose nuzzles before he went to bed, what the fuck world am I even in anymore?)

    On our way back to the hotel after a beautiful, chill first day of Riot Fest. The weather was awful when we were waiting in line (of course the gates didn’t open until 90 minutes after they were supposed to) but it was gorgeous for the rest of the day. No repeats of last year!

The drive to Chicago was super uneventful. We left after work yesterday and drove as far as South Bend, IN and crashed at the Waterford, which is my favorite hotel in South Bend. (Also the only one I’ve ever stayed at, but Henry was going to book a different hotel and I flipped out because WATERFORD.) Got to Chicago around 9:30 and then Bobby from Lyft carted our asses to Douglas Park. So many beautiful bands were seen today. 

Here’s a picture of Henry giving some French Canadian broad directions in a city he doesn’t even live in. Professional driver 4 lyfe.  
I’m really looking forward to taking my boots off and hounding Henry about what parts of today were his favorite. I feel so heart-eyed right now. 

Not even the dump Henry has us staying in can ruin that. (But it comes close. Hilariously, Golden Girls is on right now and Rose, talking about Miles, just said, “He’s not just frugal, he’s frickenfrugal! What, it’s a Scandinavian term.” #apropos.)

You can’t go anywhere in my house without Robert Smith creeping.

TGIF, for real. Looking forward to a super short week next week because RIOT FEST. The food vendors were announced the other day and I am almost as excited for that as I am for the bands. Dark Matter coffee is there again and I’m really excited to drink so much of their magicical brew that it starts pouring out of my eyes.

Let’s cap this off with a Cure video. We’ll go with “More Than This” because it’s been a minute since I’ve cried to this one. Robert, you can creep on me ANYTIME.

We had to stop at Henry’s work (near the pet store where his pregnant mistress works) for a few minutes. Chooch wanted me to take pictures of him hanging off the parked train on the tracks by the river and I went along with it because I had nothing better to do. 

Chooch has a ridiculous amount of band shirts for a kid his age. My hope is that it will be a conversation starter with the other homogenous kids in his school and possibly spark interest and awareness that music exists outside of the radio. TEACH ‘EM WHILE THEY’RE YOUNG. But when I asked Chooch if anyone asked him about his Bring Me The Horizon shirt, he was like pfffffffft.
   
 

Sooooooo serious. 

In other news, we are definitely having a pie party next month and my friends are way more excited for this than I expected–and that’s made me even more excited! I have been spending all of my free time scouring for the perfect pie(s) for Henry to bake. You will be seeing a lot more of this subject over the next month, and for that I offer my advanced apologies. 

PIE. 

 
Today was Chooch’s first day of fourth grade and I’m trying to ask him how it was, and you’d think I was torturing him. The thing I remember most vividly about when I was in 4th grade was that there were so many “bad seeds” in my class that we forced our teacher into early retirement. Not sure how factual that is, considering my mom was the one who told me that. 

Anyway, here is what I learned about Mr. Sunshine’s first day of 4th grade:

Fourth grade is cool. He likes it. Josh isn’t in my class and that’s good. (Josh is a bully & those two constantly have to be separated, plus his mom screamed in my face so they can both suck it.) Lunch was terrible because it’s a school lunch.  He sat with David, a kid that left and then came back, apparently. 

The principal said “I like your hair.” He doesn’t have hair so Chooch didn’t say it back. 

He walked to school with DiMaggio. 

Cassie didn’t talk to him at all and he’s acting like he doesn’t care and maybe he doesn’t, because he does have twin girlfriends now after all. 

He didn’t see the HOT GYM TEACHER all day and then Henry said he’s not here this year, and I freaked out but then he said he was just kidding. Thank god. Hot Gym Teacher is literally the only reason I bother attending school concerts and Halloween parades. 

Chooch has nothing else to say and we’re ALL IN A BAD MOOD apparently UGH!!! MONDAY!