Rule #1: Cardio.

With the upcoming presidential elections looming ever closer, we as a nation have been taking a lot of time scrutinizing the issues at hand; the economy, foreign policies, immigration, the middle east, gay marriage, and for some reason Sesame Street is now an important factor in determining who to vote for....
     Facebook has become a veritable battle ground for would-be political debaters. I personally find that keeping my opinion off of facebook helps me to maintain my ever-dwindling sanity (not to mention many of my friends).  However, I have noticed in the past few months that a very important issue has been blatantly, if not purposely, ignored. I for one find myself VERY concerned with this particular topic and would repeal my personal rule to keep political opinions off of facebook in order to discuss the ever growing threat to ALL political parties. If we are to be a nation OF the people, well then we all need to be concerned with raising awareness for......

ZOMBIES.

Yes, the growing zombie threat is one that our country's leaders are ignoring to our GREAT detriment. I believe that the zombie apocalypse is closer at hand than any of us would like to think about and the time has come to draw awareness to this issue and prepare ourselves accordingly!

Lets look at the facts:

1.) Zombies are dead, and gross, and scary.

2.) A Zombie's only desire is to kill you and eat your brain and/or infect you (though, on second thought they probably don't really have 'desires' being zombies and all)

3.) Zombies probably smell really bad (you know, because of the whole 'dead' thing).

4.) According to a handful of zombie movies (or as I like to call them, 'Important study materials') zombies might be able to run, which quite frankly, is scary as %$*#.

And finally,

5.)  This article.

There are many important measures that ought to be taken into consideration by ALL citizens of the United States who do not wish to become zombies, or zombie food. I will support any candidate who can appropriately present a platform that will help this country prepare for the impending zombie apocalypse. 

I feel that this is TRULY an important issue and I want to see it addressed ASAP!

Also I am pretty sure the majority of Congress are already zombies.

Working Girl.

 It is now October  and I haven't updated since the end of May. I think that may be a manifestation of my deep and abiding hatred of Summer.
Okay, I don't hate ALL of it, just most of it, like 98% of it. The time between June and October seems unnecessary to me . Sure it's broken up by a couple of sporadically 'fun' days; Independence day is alright with the barbecue and fireworks, Andrew's birthday on July 23rd (He is FOUR now!!), and I like swimming before the pools start feeling like bathtubs but that's really it. Because 'summer' really starts in late April/early May in southeast Texas and summer in southeast Texas means constant heat and humidity, and I am over it by June.
Anyways, My summer so far:
                    1.)  Apparently I am addicted. To running. All the time. I find myself unbalanced and off if I don't. I never had this issue before, indeed I used to HATE running and now, well now I need it. It doesn't make any sense whatsoever, because I DO hate the summer, and the heat but somehow I still find myself running in it for five miles every day and do in fact feel really good afterwords. I guess there are worse things to be addicted to.
                   2.) My kids are awesome.

Do I really need to elaborate further?

                     3.) I acquired employment. Yep, I got a job. My 'official' title is "foodserver" at Chili's. All I really do though, is ask people which kind of baby-back ribs they want, or which kind of Chicken crispers they want.

Admit it though; despite the generic "bathroom-pic"
quality, you'd still want me to take your order ;)

That's pretty much it for my summer.

No really, it was THAT boring. Sorry I don't have more to tell but between learning the difference between a 'presidente margarita' and a 'PLATINUM presidente margarita' (one is more expensive)  and trying to avoid eating all the tostada chips I didn't do much. Now that it's officially autumn though (YAY!!!) I should have more motivation to blog stuff!

 If not, there are always about 350 pictures of my kids on my iPhone!

        

Are you not ENTERTAINED???

Corinne: Hey baby, come look at this!

Rob: What is it?

Corinne: Look at the rug! Do you see the spider?

Rob: Yeah, you want me to kill it?

Corinne: Not yet, look! It's stalking that fly!

(There is a fly just sitting on the rug a fair distance away from the spider)

Rob: Oh cool!

Corinne: There is no way it will get it though, its like two feet away and the fly can like, fly you know? holy cow, its still going! It's closing the gap! DUDE! That fly is just SITTING there!

Rob: Oh man!

Corinne: I KNOW! 

(Spider jumps on fly and a struggle ensues)

Corinne: HOLY CRAP, he got it! Did you see that? He totally just pounced on it!

Rob: (moving to hover over the carnage) The fly is still struggling! 

Corinne: Get your phone out and take some pictures!

Rob: Oh yeah! (pulls out iPhone and takes LOTS of pictures and video)

Corinne: I feel like Caesar watching the gladiators in the ring! "Are we not entertained???"

Rob: Oh man, I can see the where the mandibles punctured it! This camera is awesome! The fly is still struggling!

Corinne: You know we are still killing the spider. I just think we should let him finish eating first though. Ya know, let him enjoy his last meal.

Maternal Musings.

Mothers day. It's approaching. Stores have the big cardboard displays of quaint mothers day cards, and plastic wrapped bouquets of brightly colored daisies. Mothers day is one of those days that means a lot to many people, causes sadness and regret for others, and to some, is just another sunday. The fact of the matter is; we are all the result of a mother. Love her, or hate her, you are all here today because you have a mother. I am pretty lucky, because my mother is awesome, like, 'Store bought cheese is for squares. I am making my own cheese!' awesome. I'm pretty sure she gets the awesome from my grandmother, who is pretty much the best person I know.  I myself have earned to title of 'mom' and, if you know me, you know that I love it. (and if you didn't know before, now you do)
      I have always been fascinated with being a mom, but not just the basics of being a mom, though that is where it began. The stereotypical, feeding, washing, and rocking babies that I was so obsessed with as a small child.

And this. This is not my doll, but is essentially identical to the
one I owned. Her name was Mary Nicole and you could not convince me
that she WASN'T my baby...

As I got older, I became aware of 'the mechanics' so to speak, of being a mother. I remember being about five or six years old and hearing some neighbor lady spell out the word 'Sex' in hushed tones, which I thought strange, because a) I knew how to read, and b)  she could have said it aloud and the word itself would have meant nothing to me. I finally asked my parents and got the quintessential "talk" that satisfied me for the moment. It turned out to be the first in a series of "talks" that educated me based on my level of understanding at whatever age I was at the time. Being the strange child that I was, I found it all incredibly fascinating. I was the kid who took out books in the library that detailed all the internal anatomy and other things involving "puberty"(Is it just me or does the word itself sound weird and gross to anyone else? Say it out loud and think about it...). And while I knew the biological reasons behind them, some things ('nocturnal emissions' anyone?) still kinda freaked me out. 
           I could take time here to detail the 'emotional' aspect of my growth as an adolescent, and the contributions it had to my ultimately becoming a mother, but it includes a first kiss story that involves a fifteen year old me, in the bedroom of a seventeen year old, who had star wars sheets on his bed, and nobody really wants to hear about that...
     When I was married, and pregnant with my first child, I was working at a bookstore/coffee shop, and spent a good deal of my down time in the health section of the book department, reading about pregnancy, and specifically, what can go wrong. I don't recommend this as it can be  terrifying. Seriously, I dare you to google 'Molar Pregnancy' and not be at least a little bit freaked out.
 When it came time to evict my husband's and my little genetic mash up, I went in confident that I knew what to expect, and was pleasantly surprised that I was right: It hurt like a &#*@!&@%$*!$ and I came out of it with a cute little baby!
   Nearly four years later I have two of 'em, and eventually, would like more. And, as mothers day rolls around again, I am forced to reflect not only on all the 'mothers' in my life, (my own, and all the people I know who are mothers) but my role as 'mother' to my own offspring. I really do hope I am doing at the very least an 'adequate' job. I mean....my kids seem happy enough......

I am gonna go wash the peanut butter out of my daughter's hair now.

Happy Mothers day Everyone!

"And, Aubrey was her name"

 Having a daughter has been a very different experience than having a son. Perhaps it has something to do with the differences between boys and girls, but I am inclined to believe that her personality is just that different from her brother's. As a result, my little girl is constantly teaching me things,  such as:

how important it is for me to be holding her at least 75% of every day:

(The other 25% of the time, Daddy suffices)

She has taught me how determined she is to get her hands on my phone EVEN when I have 'hidden it' under the couch cushion:

She has taught me how important the cats are to her (and what fantastic pillow pets they make):

She has taught me that I can't trust her to be hesitant of the swimming pool like her older brother is. She WILL just climb into the water and give me a mini heart attack:

She has taught me that very few children can pull off pigtails that have absolutely NO curl to them whatsoever, and stick straight out, but she can do it and still look amazing and adorable:

She has taught me the importance of PUSHING those gender boundaries!

She DARES you to replace
that truck with a doll!

She has taught me how adorable bedtime can be!

....Okay so Andrew has contributed a good deal to the bedtime cuteness.

I kinda love her...a lot.

"a not so very ordinary girl or name..."

Dr. Facebook

There is a lot of complaining going on about what happens on facebook in recent months. Failblog has even dedicated an entire section of its website to facebook fails!
Since I am SUCH a facebook veteran (6 1/2 years kids, 6 1/2 YEARS!) I feel that I can appropriately diagnose and recommend treatment for many of the ailments and diseases that are spreading around facebook like the bloody plague! Just call me Dr. Facebook! (or at the very least, Nurse Practitioner Facebook)

Here are a few of my new contributions to the DSM IV:

Diagnoses: "Severe text-speak syndrome"

• Symptoms: Every status update, or comment posted follows absolutely 0 of the rules of proper grammar nor do they even sound like normal spoken conversation when repeated out loud. Words that everyone who has passed the second grade should know how to spell, are purposefully misspelled. Often when a correction is attempted, it is met with further ignorance.

ex: "OMG y r so many ppl stupid? srsly me n mii bff r liek teh only ppl i no who rnt dum!"

• Treatement: My recommendation is for everyone else to completely ignore these types where all possible. Often it will run its course and the person suffering will grow a few more brain cells, graduate high school, and hopefully, feel intense and severe amounts of shame at EVER writing like that. 

Diagnoses: "Acute Attention Whore-dom" or  AAW!! 

• Symptoms: At least once a day, a status is updated to a vague, often melancholy, and always shamelessly attention seeking update, frequently ending such an update with an ellipsis.  ex: " this is the most terrible thing to have ever happened to me..." When some well meaning person attempts to ask what is wrong, they are usually met with, "I don't want to talk about it..."

• Treatment: My professional recommendation is this: DON'T FREAKING POST IT ON FACEBOOK IF YOU "DON'T WANT TO TALK ABOUT IT" !!!

Diagnoses: "Obsessive, Compulsive Sharing Syndrome" 

•  Symptoms :  At least every other status update is a 're-share' of some inspirational quote about motherhood/friendship/womanhood/'strong' womanhood/devoted motherhood/having a daughter/having a son/being a strong person/woman/bitch etc. This will often accompany a picture of a cute puppy/kitten/bunny/sunset/rose/beach landscape/blue with pixelated sparkles etc. These people have very little to say of themselves, yet still feel drawn to click "share" whenever they see a picture that somebody else shared recently that they feel applies to them in some way.
• Treatment: In my 'professional' opinion the sufferer should spend some time away from his/her computer, and possibly get outside and see some real life trees to remind themselves that, not every pretty tree has some gag-inducing quote about how 'unique each individual is' plastered over it in monotype corsiva. Perhaps do something that could be used as material for an original status update.

Diagnoses: "Chronic Compulsive Opinion Tourettes"

• Symptoms: Multiple times a week (if not day) this person posts either an original status update, or a link to a blog/article/picture/meme supporting his/her feelings on Atheism/extreme Christianity/Some other severely controversial topic. This person usually accompanies this link to a picture or article with some sarcastic, inflammatory comment towards whichever group they are against. Often they appear to be trying to spark heated arguments, only to eventually explode at everyone.

ex: "F*** all you sheep! You are all f****** idiots!!"

• Treatment: a Rx for Self Restrainex™, with unlimited refills. No generic brand available.

Diagnoses: "Originality Dysfunction Disorder" 

• Symptoms: Multiple times a day, a status is updated with random song lyrics. Occasionally they are put in quotation marks to let people know that they are actually quoting someone. Often however, there is no use of quotations, causing the confused (often older, adults unfamiliar with what is currently playing on the radio)  to ask questions about why you want to "take down dominoes all the time."
• Treatment: If you can't post something original, limit it to once a week, and for gosh sakes use quotation marks!

Diagnoses: "Extreme Over-Reaction Syndrome"

• Symptoms: These people are often simultaneously suffering from CCOT. They find a status update/shared link, that talks about something they disagree with, and proceed to slam the poster either very harshly, or sarcastically, and sometimes both. These people then continue to wait until the original poster responds to their comments and continuously bash and demean them until the original poster either deletes their comments from their page, or un-friends them, or both.
• Treatment: The Self Restrainex™ often works well for sufferers of these types as well. Often the antagonized will feel that retribution in like manner (trolling comments on his/her profile and status updates) are necessary, however this is a mistake, and can often lead to unwanted "facebook wars" which should be avoided at all cost, as they exacerbate nearly all of the symptoms of every facebook illness.

There are many other serious Facebook maladies out there, but these are currently some of the worst.

On second thought, just prescribe everyone some Self Restrainex™ Heaven knows we could all benefit from it!

What I've been up to.

I have been a very negligent blogger lately. You may be wondering, "Why is that Corinne? What is more important than us, the 4-5  people, (who are more than likely related to you, and therefore, grudgingly obligated) who read your blog?" Well let me tell you...stuff. Very important stuff. Stuff like this:

See that? And with only 2% battery power left! VERY important stuff!