Bow Chicka Bow WOW!

So, I love The Smoking Gun.  


They send me fun little personal e-mails like once a week, just to let ME know what funny (mostly illegal) things are going on in my large, fantastic planet. That's right.  They're like,

Dear Veronica,

How are you?  We are super.  Here are some AWESOME things we wanted to tell you about before we put them on our website.  That way YOU know things before everyone else, because you are super-important and will one day be Master of the Universe.  So here are the funnies ...

And then I'm like, That's right, bitches and I kick my feet up and chuckle at the expense of others.  I highly recommend it.


So here is my favorite happening as of late:  A high school in Wisconsin made some very specific rules for their school dances.


And I have a copy of those rules for you!  At first it's all like blah blah dress code blah blah guest passes, but THEN ... then there is the "Dancing" section.  I won't ruin the surprise.  Read for yourself:


(WARNING:  I sincerely apologize for the Comic Sans that is about to assault your eyeballs.  Blame Wisconsin.)

Yeah.  That's right.  They banned SEXUAL BENDING.  I always wondered what they called that.  We called it "dirty dancing" or "dance humping" or, if you were me (or any other brand of goody-two-shoes), "scandalous."


I also sincerely enjoy the use of the word "buttocks" and that they specifically have to ask the students not to touch each other's genitals.  They have some spicy dances in the land of cheese!!


However, did anyone else notice that little throw-away comment at the end about the dances being videotaped?  Hmmm ... at a school where they specifically had to make rules prohibiting "sexual bending"?  I wonder who is viewing these tapes.  I'm just sayin' ...

Devil Man Gets His Comeuppance

Let me tell you a tale.  A terrible tale in which I, a PREGNANT WOMAN, got shoved belly-first into a stone wall.

Did you have enough time for that to sink in?  No?  Okay, I'll repeat it.  A terrible, evil, rude fat man pushed my pregnant belly into a stone wall.

The day was Friday, and the place was the Smokey Bones restaurant in Lansing.  My dad had just gotten out of a meeting, and we got to the restaurant right in the middle of the 6 o'clock rush. The place was packed to the gills, and we were looking at a 45-minute wait.  I was feeling very claustrophobic in the waiting area, so my mom and I moved behind the hostess stand and stood up against the wall to be out of the way.

I have provided a 100% realistic rendering of this night so you can accurately imagine this scenario.

Also, please be assured that this is an ACCURATE representation of the restaurant and the placement of people within it.  I ran it by two hostesses, a waiter, and they original architect, and they all stated the dimensions were exact.  So, don't worry about that.

As you can see, there were tons of people, so I moved to a place where there were NOT a lot of people, and I was not in anyone's way.  You will see how much space is in between myself and the lovely fake fireplace.  A very large walkway, I would say.

However, a large, mean, stupid-looking gentlemen, who had just gotten done yelling at the hostess for not being seated quickly enough (because THAT always helps, right?) began walking past me on the way to the bar.  Instead of walking PAST me, at the last minute he SHOVED me.  Like, he used his hands as well as his large body.  Because I was looking at the dining area and talking to my mom about how full it was, I did not see him coming.  Also, because I was facing the wall, my stomach smashed into it.  

I was stunned.  I could not, seriously, could NOT believe what had just happened.  I spun around to get a look at the suspect, but by then, he was already getting his comeuppance.

The moment his ham-sized (and probably booger-covered) hands had smashed into me for NO REASON, the bartender LEAPED over the bar, ran up to him, and karate chopped him in the neck.  The jerk man immediately fell to the floor.  "Why?" the mean man whimpered in a baby voice.

"Did you just push that amazingly gorgeous pregnant woman?" the bartender shouted in his face with his foot on his chest, holding him to the ground.  "Yeah.  So what?" the asshat replied.  

BIG mistake.  Before the bartender even had time to respond, I shouted out the secret signal, and my legion of ninjas moved in with the speed of ... well, ninjas.  While they began beating the crap out of the lady pusher, my father and husband came running out of the bathroom.  

"What's going on??!?" my husband shouted.  "My spidey-sense told me that something was wrong.  That man on the ground.  He hurt you, didn't he?"  The rage quickly filled the eyes of my husband and father, but I held them back.  "Don't bother," I calmly replied.  "No need to get your hands dirty."  And, indeed, when they looked over, the ninjas had already taken care of the evil man.

The owner of the restaurant then came over and told the man that evil idiots were not welcome in his restaurant, and threw him out into the cold, where he lay, broken and bleeding, until the police came and took him away.

Sweet justice.

What really happened:

I gave the mean man a dirty look. 

Then, I made sure to keep an eye on him the rest of the 45-minute wait.  I gave him the evil eye any time he dared meet my eyeline.  I also made note of the fact that he yelled at the hostess three more times, and then WE got seated before him, despite the fact that he was there before us and we had the same size parties.  

So, even though my ninjas, the bartender, my father and my husband didn't dole out any vigilante justice, he got his.  Beware, jerks of the world:  Being rude will NOT get you ahead in life.

Etsy Saturdays: V

In support of the handmade revolution, I bring you Etsy Saturdays!  I will highlight a fun new shop every week, and I hope you will stop over to see their merchandise or find something else you love while you're there.  To see all Etsy Saturdays, click here.
*I have not been compensated in any way for this post*

This week's artist made me laugh, which, in general, is the key to my heart.  Trixie Delicious "vandalizes" vintage pieces of china and gives them a little extra sass and pizazz.  Just the way I like it.


This is the teacup that caught my eye and made me do a spit-take with my tea:

Slut teacup, $30

And this would be a hilarious wedding gift:

Sinner Saint teacup duo, $45

And a lovely addition to any home:

 

Nerd Dork snack bowls, $40

I'm Pretty Sure I'd Rather be Fighting Forest Fires. Or Battling Zombies. (Now with Updates)

So, today's kind of a big day.  I'm using the crockpot for the first time.  


The large, lovely crockpot we received for our wedding. The one only my darling husband has used to prepare meals.


And I feel like a little part of me died.


No offense to all those ladies who are actually GOOD at cooking and LIKE it, but I have never been a Becky Home-Ecky and have always known I never would be.  Why is it that being a good wife and mom requires terrible, awful things, like TOUCHING RAW MEAT and SMELLING IT COOK ALL DAY?  I seriously have a headache from the ... odor in my house.


I have always had an aversion to cooking.  Always.  I take no pleasure in it AT ALL.  And if it were any other task in the world, like, pole vaulting, and I was terrible at it and hated it, no one would care if I stopped doing it.  They would likely encourage me to quit.  But cooking?  Wives and mothers are supposed to care enough about their loved ones to put healthy delicious foods on their plates. So why don't I?


I got this horrible feeling the other day that I better start caring, what with this little baby baking away inside of me and taunting me with the reality that it will pop out in a few months and once it is sick of milk it will demand FOOD, and I realized that the "food lifestyle" Jeremy and I currently entertain is not conducive to children.  And I panicked.  Jeremy likes meat and I like vegetables. Some nights I come home from work at 7 and and make myself a bowl of asparagus and suggest he heat himself up a chicken pot pie.  I am pretty sure children will not benefit from this menu.


So I found a recipe for a crockpot pork roast and went and bought all the ingredients.  Then ... I had to actually USE the pork ... and look at it.  Have you ever really LOOKED at raw meat?  If you haven't, I suggest you do.  It isn't pretty.

Seriously?  People touch and cook and eat this every day??
{source}

I used to work as a cashier, and there was NOTHING worse than when people would just drop their barely-wrapped chunks of raw meat on my belt.  Like they really didn't notice that it was oozing blood and juices full of food-borne-illness-causing monsters all over the counter and their other groceries and my HANDS? My LOVELY hands??  Or, if they don't care about strangers, can't they at least imagine those little bloody particles traveling from their hands to their MOUTHS and EYES and CHILDREN'S FOOD AND FACES???  GAH!!!!!  


And now, here I am.  One of them.  And even though the damn pork loin has been in the damn crockpot for 4 hours already, it still looks terrifying.  

Does that look like a corpse that the flesh is rotting off of to anyone else?  

Because that's what it looks like to me. 

I know, there is an option of being a vegetarian.  That is all lovely in theory, but I am LAZY when it comes to food.  I hate cooking.  I think TOAST takes a long time to make.  And vegetarian cooking takes WAY more thought and planning and shopping and kitchen time.  I've tried it.  And then, of course, Jeremy would die of starvation and that would be on my conscience for the rest of my life, and that would be a dreadful burden.


So how the bloody heck am I supposed to start liking this crap?  Is there a secret?  And is it possible to re-program Jeremy's brain so he thinks he likes to cook and wants to take over the job?  Any ideas?


UPDATE:  Now I can smell the carrots cooking, so my headache is easing up. But I'm still mad at the crockpot.


UPDATE 2:  The meat-eater said it was "AWESOME!  Really, really good!"

I think it was the smell of the mustard that gave me a headache all day.  I was not a fan of the mustard "coating."  If I do it again, I will just rub the spices on without the mustard.


UPDATE 3:  Due to requests (probably because the first picture looked so weird), here is the recipe I used:

Crockpot Pork Roast Dinner

You can use any kind of mustard in this delicious, homey recipe. You can also thicken the juices if you wish after removing the roast and vegetables. Just pour the juice into a saucepan and add 2 Tbsp. cornstarch dissolved in 1/4 cup water, then bring to a boil.

Prep Time: 25 minutes

Cook Time: 8 hours, 0 minute

Ingredients:

1 lb. small red potatoes, cut in half

16 oz. pkg. baby cut carrots

1 onion, chopped

2 cloves garlic, minced

3 lb. boneless pork loin roast, trimmed of fat

1/4 cup Dijon mustard

1 tsp. dried tarragon leaves or 1 tablespoon fresh chopped tarragon

1 tsp. dried thyme leaves or 1 tablespoon fresh thyme leaves

1/2 tsp. salt

1/4 tsp. pepper

1-1/2 cups beef broth

Preparation:

Place potatoes and baby carrots around bottom edge of 4-6 quart crockpot. Place onion and garlic in bottom of crockpot. In small bowl, combine mustard, tarragon, thyme, salt and pepper and spread over pork roast. Place roast in crockpot and pour beef broth over all. Cover crockpot and cook on low for 8-9 hours until pork is 150 degrees F and vegetables are tender.

Now Jeremy Thinks We Should Name the Baby "Annie"

I JUST realized that my expectations for my adult life were a bit off ... in terms of how much dancing it would contain, in particular.

I definitely blame my parents.  They showed me COUNTLESS amazing musicals as soon as I was old enough to track things with my eyes (based on my recollection).  I soaked those babies in.  I loved them.  I STILL love them. And looking back on them now, I can remember imagining amazing situations in my adult life.


Here is a great example from the musical I must have watched over 400 times before I was 5, Annie.  The other day I convinced Jeremy to watch it with me because he had never seen it (horrors!), and at the beginning of this particular scene, one of the main characters (Grace Farrell) is walking and is very excited, and then when she finally sees someone to share her big news with, they break into a lovely choreographed dance number.  Please, enjoy:





While we were watching it, I sighed and told Jeremy that I always thought life would be like that when I was an adult.


"Like what?" he asked.


"You know, when I was feeling extreme emotion there would be someone ready to lift me in the air, spin me around, and then do some ballroom dancing and jazz hands with."


And he LAUGHED at me.  Then it hit me.  Not EVERYONE has these expectations for adult life.


At first I was a little embarrassed, but then I felt truly sorry for every poor sap who didn't imagine one day they might become a dancing lady at the movie theater (which I was positive I would do for at LEAST one year, minimum).


(skip to 3:30 to see my dream job)



And shouldn't everyone expect to be thrown a carnival-themed party by his or her adoptive father after being saved from near-death by Punjab?  Of course, you and your father would sing and tap dance for your guests at said party.





I think a large part of my connection to Annie might be something my mom told me that really stuck with me.  She told me they saw the movie right before or after I was born (I can't remember which) and they thought I was going to have big brown eyes and dark brown hair and look just like one of the orphans, Molly:

{source)

I must have been dressing up like her here:

And here (I really nailed the orphan look):

And here I am (center) being dramatic AND showing off my amazing lung capacity (perfect for singing on Broadway!):

Anyway, I loved that comparison, and I always imagined myself in the movie.  It didn't hurt that Molly and I both loved being in the limelight and had a flair for the dramatics (she fake faints three times in the movie!  I got really good at that trick.). 


I especially loved her doing "You're Never Fully Dressed."





Annie may have set me up for disappointment in my adult life, but ... what in childhood doesn't?  Being grown-up seems so fun and carefree, and you can EAT DESSERTS WHENEVER YOU WANT.  You never think about all the work and bills and crap and horribleness.


But, even as an adult, I can still watch Annie and pretend life will be full of singing and dancing and fireworks every five minutes.