I CAN ONLY TAKE SO MUCH

I can't believe it's gotten to this point, but here I am. 

I AM HAVING AN ARGUMENT WITH A TOY. ALOUD. VERY ANGRILY.

Wait, let me preface this by saying two things:

1) We are so lucky to be able to have toys for our children. Many more toys than they would ever realistically need. 

2) I'm sure many (most?) of you have gotten to the point where you want to go all Office Space on one of your kid's toys EVEN IF IT'S ONE OF HIS OR HER FAVORITES because it has pushed you so far over the edge with its level of annoyingness. I know this is not a new phenomenon. I have a few of those toys. 

One day, B. Meowsic Keyboard. One day. 

This is way beyond all that. We have an adorable little pretend vacuum (Aside: Toy companies. Make those tiny vacuums FUNCTIONING VACUUMS. Love, Everyone.) (Second aside: Is that really how you spell vacuum? I've never been able to spell it. Don't you think it needs two Cs in there?) that the girls LOVE. It's very cute. Except for the fact that in between making vacuum noises, it has "funny" little quips. At first I was able to ignore them, but yesterday was just the straw that broke the camel's back.

Vacuum: What a pigsty!

Me: Good one. That one gets me every time. Very funny. My housekeeping skills are subpar. HILARIOUS.

Vacuum: *Cough cough* We must clean up the dust!

Me: Right, it's dusty in here because I never clean. I GET IT. SHUT UP ALREADY.

Vacuum: Whoa! Did a tornado blow through here?

Me: You can go STRAIGHT TO HELL, BUDDY. I TRY MY BEST!! *collapses in a puddle of tears*

Vacuum: *dopey laugh*

It's been a long week, you guys.

Something Had to Give

Some of you already know this about me, some of you may have guessed it from the boxes on my page, and some of you may have pieced this together because of all the pictures of my pets in my posts:  I am an animal LOVER.  


People supposedly have "passions" in life.  I never knew what mine was. There was no perfect career for me because I didn't have that one thing I loved enough to make it my "thing."  Like, you know how some people have that one bumper sticker on their car?  I imagine it was easy for them to choose what to display because it is their passion in life (I know this is not heavy philosophical stuff and pretty obvious, but play along here).  The person with a band bumper sticker is a music fanatic, the person with a bumper sticker bashing Bush is passionate about politics, and the person with the "This car could be a Porsche if I didn't own a horse!" bumper sticker -- yeah, passionate about horses.  The thing is, I could never commit to ONE bumper sticker.  I didn't have a ONE THING.


But then I finally realized -- it's animals.  I definitely like animals more than people.  I love my animals so much they make me cry sometimes (much to my husband's chagrin and horror).  When we watch movies, not only do we HAVE to stay in the theater until the "No animals were harmed in the making of this film" statement, but I cry when animals are hurt in the films.  


If we are watching a battle scene where people are getting brutally slaughtered left and right and then ONE horse gets hurt ... I FUH-REAK. Jeremy is like, "what about all the people who are getting fake hurt?"  Oh please.  Those people chose to be there.  The animals were forced.  And animals don't want to participate in war!!!  They are innocent and beautiful and wonderful and they don't deserve to be treated like machinery!!!!  


So, anyway, I am an animal freak.  And I swear this post has a point.


While I love animals, I have not always been such a fan of bugs.  However, I have trained myself to not be a hypocrite and tolerate bugs.  They are living things and just trying to live their lives and do their jobs.  So I really try not to kill bugs.  Now, most creepy crawlies don't bother me, but arachnids and centipedes still make me lose my shit.  I have found a loophole there: I make my husband kill them and I close my eyes.  If I don't see it, it may never have happened, right?


This morning, however, I had a little set back.  I have been kind to ants for quite a few years now.  I cannot remember the last time I killed one.  Maybe it is because we don't have excessive ants in our house, but it is not really an issue.  This morning, however, I was putting away dishes from the draining rack and saw an ant WALKING ON ONE OF MY PLATES!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!


At first I tried to reason with the ant.  I was like, "Hey, ant.  How about going outside?  I don't want  you spreading germs in my house, okay?"  No response.  In fact, it moved on to a glass and started crawling around.  This took me from zero to one hundred in a second.  I picked up a tub of margarine and shouted at the ant through clenched teeth, "Do you realize I now have to wash EVERY DISH IN THIS HOUSE because I am PSYCHOTIC and it is ALL BECAUSE OF YOU??"  When the ant ignored me -- SMASH! Still alive.  SMASH!  Writhing around in pain.  I felt bad for a second, but ... SMASH!  Better to put it out of its misery, right?


So, now I am officially a killer of living things.  Where will it go from here? Should I just go ahead and start operating a factory farm?  Is this who I have become?  Maybe instead of starting the factory farm I'll just start shouting for Jeremy every time I see an ant.    


Okay, I just told him my new plan to call for him every time I see an ant, and he said, "Good lord.  I don't think so."  Thanks a lot HUSBAND.  I am pretty sure you are breaking one of our vows.  Look it up.

Yes, I Stopped Taking My Medication When I Got Pregnant. How Could You Tell?

It started out so innocently. A Girls Night with friends from high school. A Girls Night in which I could not drink, meaning there was a good chance I could maintain my rational thinking and dignity.  


It all took a turn for the worst when my friend Amanda, who just bought a Ford Focus, asked if my Ford Focus also had a funny little safety latch inside the trunk that included directions for a person to escape from a trunk.  

Jump from trunk and run to safety!  DO IT!

Yes, in fact, I have the safety latch and am very familiar with its location in the event that I needed to free myself from a trunk. Another friend, Ellie, started laughing.


"Why would you need THAT?" she asked, and I launched into a self-righteous safety monitor lecture. "Well, Ellie, what if you were being CARJACKED by an evil CARJACKER and placed in the trunk? What if you were being KIDNAPPED by an evil MURDERER-slash-RAPIST and being transported in your own trunk to the designated kill spot? Hmmm? What IF?"


So, Ellie, who is a nice and lovely person and did not even seem to mind that I was being an ass, was like, "We should definitely try it out in that case -- to see if you could actually get free!"


And we did.

A pregnant lady stuffing another lady in a trunk.  Pretty casual Saturday.

People were laughing, photos were being snapped furiously, and it was all well and good.  Then Ellie reported that it was VERY difficult to get out of the trunk.  

UMMM, WHAT? You were not able to hop like a bunny rabbit out of the trunk? Because that was part of my plan. Do you know what this means? I now have to re-evaluate my escape-from-a-trunk plan. Dear God. This will require weeks of research, test runs, night sweats, and vivid nightmares. But that is nothing compared to what is next.

All of my plans ... they must all be re-evaluated.  

I mean, everyone knows that the proper position for a bathroom door is OPEN and the corresponding correct position for a shower curtain is OPEN, even if you have an ugly green tub like mine. This is, of course, so a killer cannot use the shower as a hiding spot from which to spring and kill. But what have I overlooked?  

Yep, you guessed it. Even if the bathroom door is open, there might be a few inches of space behind it. What about SKINNY killers? He could easily slide his emaciated body behind my bathroom door, and then when I am all like la-dee-da, minding my own business and heading to the sink to floss, he will pounce and kill and then stand over me and ask, "Was your oral hygiene REALLY that important in the long run?" and with my last breath I will say, "You better believe it, you bastard. I got tons of compliments on my smile." Then I will smile and die and he will be like, Hmm, she really does have a great smile. I should floss more. Then he will probably steal my big screen TV. And my floss.  

Okay, I have lots of other plans too.  

Like, when I walk to my car, I always have a key in between my pointer and middle fingers, ready to STAB and then TURN like my dad taught me. More damage, he says. But ... I have never actually tested this stab-and-turn attack. And what is the best part of the body to stab?  My dad told me at the tender age of 11 that if I ever had to stab an attacker with a knife, I could disable him by stabbing in the thigh and turning the blade and he would not be able to chase me. But will a key work as well as a knife? Well, no. So how can I legally and ethically test this stabbing technique until I find the most debilitating stab location for a key? Because a pig carcass won't work, so don't even suggest it. I need a live subject so I can gauge the pain I am inflicting.

BUT, if I have to get that close to an attacker before I can fight back, maybe I should just go with my dad's number one move. He was smart enough to teach his little girl how to use her thumbs to pop someone's eyes out. Again ... I have yet to test it. I trust that it will work, because my dad is kind of like a ninja (the kind of ninja who is a retired shop teacher and has a bum knee), but I have no EVIDENCE, and if I am re-evaluating all my killer-killing skills, I need to be SURE.

What have we learned here?  

1.  I am crazy.

2.  I have a lot of spare time on my hands.

3.  I need to take my bathroom door off its hinges.

4.  I need an able-bodied man who is willing to endure multiple stab wounds and having his eyes popped out.  

I will be distributing a sign-up sheet for subjects. And if you also happen to be a killer or think you might begin being a killer in the near future, you are EXACTLY the subject I am looking for. I need to know this is a REAL test run, and not some person with an actual soul just phoning it in to make me feel better. 

Thanks for your time. Please do not send me e-mails with the names and phone numbers of psychiatrists (MOM).

Truth and Consequences, New Mexico: This One's for YOU

So, I did something bad.  Not killed-a-drifter bad or wrote-in-a-library-book bad, but bad in Veronica Land.


I signed up for Google Analytics.  Seasoned bloggers are already anticipating my problem and shaking their knowledgeable heads.  Non-bloggers are like jigga-what?  


I'll tell you what.  Google Analytics is a tracking device that tells you how many people visit your site, on which days, how long they stay, and where in the world they live.  The problem?  Well, they are many-fold (or two-fold):


Number one.  I had a major freak-out the first time I checked the data and saw how many people visited my blog over the course of a few days. 

Like, I may or may not have burst out singing "She blogs HARD for the money!!" -- even though I have yet to be paid for my mad genius blogging skillz.  


I was alone, so there was no embarrassment to shake off, but singing a parody of "She Works Hard for the Money" reminded me that McDonald's had used it for a jingle, and then I thought of bad food and the fats, and I was grossed out.  Plus, McDonald's is all evil and everything, which everyone knows, and I hate thinking about evil things.  But, then again, they do have Egg McMuffins, which are amazing and basically saved my life during my first trimester.  So maybe McDonald's isn't THIS evil:

and just THIS evil:

But seriously, it was a bit overboard to get as excited as I did.


Second problem.  Since I know when people are visiting and where they are visiting from, I have a million questions.


For example, how did I garner the attention of countries such as Pakistan, Macau, Uruguay, South Korea, and Sri Lanka?  And how do I get MORE of their attention?  

(It's hard to see, but all countries with light green have visited a handful of times)

And what about all the countries who have yet to visit?  Look at Russia.  No hits.  And I got no love from China.  Well, I am probably blocked over there, but that doesn't seem to be a good enough reason.

So should I have some specific Russian-friendly content to attract the Russians mixed with something about ... um, fish? ... to keep my readers from Sweden?

And don't even get me started about the U S of A.  

I mean, what did I do to South Dakota?  Probably all the cursing about snow. You think?  And New Mexico?  I LOVE the land of Enchantment.  I have never actually BEEN there, but I hear it is lovely.  Plus it has cities with names like "Truth and Consequences."  Fan-freaking-tastic.

But I only need to attract five states to fill up the map, and that's not bad at all.  So now I need some feedback from y'all.  (See how I am relating to the Southern readers there?  Smooth, right?)  What do I do to reel those states in?

And finally, it seems that my readership peaks on Wednesdays.

I don't even know what to do with that exactly.  I'm sure it has something to do with people trying to get through humpday.  But if I have my super-bestest stuff on Wednesdays, then maybe more people will follow and comment. Because, bottom line?  After I got all overly excited, I checked my followers. Did I have any more?  NO.  Did I start getting more comments?  NO.


Sigh.  All of that brain power, wasted.  And I actually sat down and imagined an evil golden arches and a less-evil golden arches.  


Did that get me any new followers?  ...


Nope.


I need to get Jeremy to say some more funny stuff so I can just transcribe him.  That man is a gold mine (and I know because Google Analytics told me so).

Dear Parking Lot Guy: I Will Remember Your Face for All of My Days. Watch Your Back.

Okay, so I have the super-duper-mad rants today. Like, there is so much madness in my blood right now that it is liable to jump around so hard that all of a sudden it will get sick of staying inside me and use its monster teeth to rip through my veins and then squirt out and get all over YOUR FACE. So WATCH OUT.

Just kidding. I love you all. I am really just mad at this little punk ass bitch who ruined my morning.  

Let me set the scene for you: It is pouring rain. I am five minutes late for work. There is not a parking space in sight across the HUGE campus parking lot. Then ... that looks like a spot! A spot! I race over, only to find ...

I kid you not. A truck taking up FOUR SPACES because the person who owns it is SO IMPORTANT that they must keep away from the rabble around them. At this point, I was already seething. Really? REALLY?!?! You think this is acceptable behavior, truck guy? You think it is okay to STEAL three parking spaces from people who need them just because you have some sort of compensation thing going on with you and your big red truck?

I was sitting there thinking about how much I wanted to punch this person and trying to remember if there were surveillance cameras that would catch me keying this assbutt's car when, all of a sudden, I realized that the guy was SITTING IN HIS CAR. Yeah. Just hanging out and enjoying the weather. Watching us lowly peasants look for spots that didn't exist because of HIM.

So I did what anyone with a rage problem would do. I motioned for him to move. Repeatedly.  Like, many many times. He stared me right in the eyes and otherwise ignored my pleas.  So I stared at him. Staring contest, bitch. I was ready to go. My hand starting creeping toward my cell phone where I had campus security on speed dial. My heart was racing. I was screaming on the inside.

Then, just when I thought about getting out and tapping sweetly on his window, my baby gave me a rousing kick in the belly to remind me that all of my angry-lady hormones were washing over its innocent brain. 

Damn. You win this time, selfish-rude-bastard-man. I am hurting my baby over you, and now that I have realized that, I must back down. Oh, how I wish I hadn't backed down.

And now the baby is kicking me again to remind me that reliving the moment is sending bad vibes down to the baby-storing area. Crap. I was a bad mom twice in one day and the little sucker isn't even born yet. Might as well stop off for some fast food on the way home while I'm at it.

So, is there a moral to this story? Probably not. But, I do have one wish for you, my dear readers: May your rage-filled moments never be interrupted by a fetus.  

THE END

April Fools Day: The Most Ulcer-Inducing Day of The Year

It wasn't always that bad.  When I was really little, like before school age, I have memories of telling my dad he had a spider on his head and then shrieking "APRIL FOOL!!!!!" before he even had time to act scared and pantomime brushing a spider off of his head.  I remember thinking this was the most hilarious April Fool in the history of time, and therefore repeated it over and over again throughout the day.  I was on fire.


But then school came.  And the thought of getting fooled MYSELF became a very real possibility.  As a slightly ... how do you say? ... ANXIOUS child, the thought of being fooled, ESPECIALLY by my peers and IN FRONT of the rest of them (and the nuns, who would likely report to Jesus that I was a major fool, and if you combine that with my measly 98% on my last math assignment, I was pretty sure Jesus would have said, "Sigh.  Send her straight to Hell.  Don't even wait for her to die.") -- pure terror.  


Yes, I was that child who was sure that bad grades would send her to the fiery pits of hell; that if I took my nap and let my mom out of my sight, she would surely die and I would lose my last precious moments with her; that stepping on cracks truly DID have a detrimental effect on my poor mother's back.  Also, if a child played an April Fool's Day prank on me, it did NOT mean that he or she was being a normal child and having fun.  It meant he or she was trying to SHAME me in front of everyone and I was chosen me because he or she hated me most out of every other person they had ever met.


Can you believe I survived to adulthood without a heart attack or diagnosed ulcers?  I cannot.


Anyway, April Fool's Day became a day of strategy.  Step one -- try to convince mom I am dying of diphtheria or dysentery or smallpox.  This first step always failed.  Step two -- CONSTANT VIGILANCE.  All day long, I would be looking over my shoulder, questioning everyone, and of course turning down any gifts or favors.  Someone said I could cut in line?  Then there must be a bucket of oatmeal over that spot that they would dump onto my head!  Ignore!!  Someone said I could borrow their scissors instead of waiting for another pair to free up?  There must be superglue on the scissors!  And maybe fire ants!  Ignore!!


This led into high school, somehow.  I seem to recall being the butt of a rather benign and lame April Fool in my freshman year, and while I had moved on to public school and decided that God was not constantly looking for ways to strike me dead, I still did not find the fooling funny.  Who wants to look like a fool?  Not someone who takes life too seriously, thank you very much.  


Now, I feel that I am healed enough to be the victim of a prank.  But that doesn't stop the rumbling in my stomach the night of March 31st.  The ten-year-old inside me shouts "VIGILANCE!!  VIGILANCE!!  VIGILANCE!!" but the adult just decides to avoid as many people as possible the next day.  Maybe I need more counseling.  


Anyway, I survived yet another April Fool's Day with no major bodily harm, shame, or emotional trauma.  I hope the same for all of you.

AHHH! The OSCARS!!! TONIGHT!!

I love watching the Oscars for a few simple reasons:


1.  I love movies.  So much.  No, like I don't think you get how much.  Like REALLY.  Never mind, you'll never understand.  You just don't GET me.  
2.  I love looking at all the dressy glitzy-ness of the red carpet.

3.  I love MAKING FUN of the unfortunate choices made by famous people's stylists.  Seriously.  Who allowed THIS to happen:

{source}

Shame on you, Demi.
4.  I love making it a competition to see who can get more correct guesses.  I thrive on the evil competitive nature that flows through my veins.
5.  I love being RIGHT.  Oh, the glory of being right and being able to put some sort of celebratory mark on that category to show that I was RIGHT and I KNOW THINGS and I am EVAH SO SMART.  What a rush.


Here is what I DON'T like about the Oscars:
1.  Too long.  Skip the crap I don't care about and get straight to the stuff I DO care about.  But this is true of everything in my life.  Wouldn't that just be fan-bloody-tastic if everything in your life could be edited to only show things you care about WHEN you want to see them.  Le Sigh.
2.  When the stupid jerkfaces who are actually allowed to vote are WRONG.  Like, when Quentin Tarantino or Martin Scorsese or Little Miss Sunshine do not win awards when they are supposed to.


Also, this year I did not properly plan for the event.  I forgot they were coming up, and I ALSO forgot that I still had 20 papers to grade.  And there is NO WAY I can justify not getting those papers back to my students tomorrow at noon.  So, so far I am making good progress on the papers, but I certainly did not imagine my magical Oscar evening including a pile of papers on my lap.  


Finally, although this really doesn't FLOW (like I didn't bother to create a THESIS and then have everything flow naturally from it and wrap up nicely at the end), I must say a little something about the Best Picture category.  Nearest and dearest to my heart, it causes me the most anguish when the film I want is not chosen.  Therefore, I am having a great deal of anxiety about this year and my amazing, precious Inglourious Basterds.  


Oh, Quentin, the fact that you made this film for me?  You have no idea how happy it makes me.  In my heart, my brain and my pants.  This movie is perfection in every way, and the magic does not dissipate with each additional viewing, like some other flash-in-the-pan movies do.  No, every time I watch this movie, I feel every emotion you are supposed to feel when watching amazing films.  I want to name my baby Quentin because of you.  (Jeremy said no.)


But I know you will not win.  I feel it in my Avatar-hating bones.  "Oh, hi, my name is James Cameron, and I have a ton of money and a ton of computers, and I love naked blue people and I can make up dumb fake languages and I don't want to actually FILM a movie and direct actors and do the things you are SUPPOSED TO DO, so I will just pay a bunch of nerds to make it on a computer."  Jerkface.  


I want to stab his jerkface and steal the Best Picture statuette and place it lovingly in Quentin's deserving hands.


But I won't, because Baby Dimick doesn't deserve to be born in prison.  It's not his/her fault that momma is bat-shit crazy.  So I will scream at my TV and maybe punch the couch a few times.  


I can't wait.

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.

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.