here's a post that will leave you unsure what to comment so you'll probably say something like 'sorry?' and then avoid eye contact with me

My Tool Man has been traveling for work the last few weeks. What could be so important that a representative of a mid-level tool company must be away from his loved ones for so long, you ask. Good question. The tool business is like Black Ops, only instead of whatever it is Black Ops agents do, this involves things like garden resets and going out to dinner every night. The black cat walks at midnight. This post will self destruct on 10 seconds, yada yada yada.

As you might imagine and a few of you know for reasons far, far less trivial, being without one's spouse for any length of time can be rough. Factor in loneliness, no one to tag team second grade math homework with, and the lack of protection from possible (though I say highly probable) Bigfoot encounters and the other loneliness that actually means sex and well, dammit, where's MY Uncle Jesse and Uncle Joey to help ME out ?

(For the homework and help with dinner part, not the sex part! Gah, did you think I meant the sex part? With Uncle Jesse and Uncle Joey?! Cut! It! Out!)

I was thrilled when Tool Man reappeared last Friday night for a brief respite after two weeks away and before having to leave again Monday for another mission (shhh...). OK, first I was scared because he crept into the dark house, and while that might be construed as some awesome role playing, he'd grown a beard while away and if you'd seen it you'd understand my long-simmering Bigfoot issues, which are not to be confused in any way with any role playing scenarios.

There was some random happy time greetings which you might imagine led to some truly hot foreplay. Go ahead and think that if you want, but that's not at all what happened. Instead we settled in to watch that week's episode of Lost. Because THAT'S the first thing you want to do after you've been away from the one you love for several days. No, wait! The first thing you want to do is have a wee little discussion of the heated variety and THEN you watch that week's episode of Lost, which your awesome wife waited four days to watch so she could watch it unadulterated with you because she is indeed awesome like that. Kind of like you're an awesome husband like that, but after eight weeks of Heroes clogging your DVR, you caved and watched, but saved them for your awesome wife, who then discovered all those hours clogging your DVR when she was trying to record something cool and actually good like Modern Family, and she was all "Dude?" and you were all "What? I thought you liked Heroes?" and she was all "Um, I broke up with Heroes in 2007. You don't even know me at all, do you?!"

(sidebar - this isn't what Secret Agent Tool Man and I ::finger quote:: discussed ::end finger quote:: but I will say that I deleted 8 hours of Heroes from the DVR Saturday)

Long story short, by Sunday morning, we couldn't remember what it was we'd opted to discuss passionately rather than be passionate, but by then, he was heading out the door to engage in another mission, and he was probably halfway toward embedding himself with another family before I realized there would been no "Guess what! No, that's not a monkey wrench in my pocket! I AM actually happy to happy to see you after two weeks and 12 hours, but who's counting welcome home sex for you! Hooray!" for me.

Which explains why I thought Sandree Lee, she of the semi-homemade wackiness, was mocking me Sunday afternoon while I was watching her Food Network show (why? no idea) when, while plating a tray of lamb kabobs, she looked out of the TV screen and directly at me and said "Make sure they have a place to put their skewers after eating your delicious kabobs!"

Oh, screw you, Sandra Lee (unless you, too, are married to a secret agent)! First you annoy me with you ever changing window treatments and array of cleverly named cocktails, but then you give me kabob envy? As one of Uncle Joey's adorable charges would say, how rude!

But wait! It gets better (or worse)! In my state of frustration, I ventured to Target to buy new underwear which I needed having broken up with ice cream and peanut butter, and when I got them home and tore open the package, the little slip of paper letting me know my new drawers had been inspected for quality control purposes fell directly onto my lap and dear lord, THIS was the number:

Thanks for rubbing it in universe.

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You might now be asking yourself what I did with all my free time since I didn't use 10 minutes out of the last 352 hours I've been alone to have sex (I kid, I kid. It's more like seven minutes). Well, Polite Fictions flipped the lights back on, so I cranked out a little something for that. Our theme this go around is the alphabet of regret. I had C, so I wrote about a cowboy. Seriously. It's early on this new round, so I highly suggest you go be awed by TwoBusy's take on A, and blown away by Ms. Picket's wicked good embrace with B. See what I just did there? Boggled your mind with some sweet alliteration. Now when you get to my chaotic go at C, you'll be like "Hmm...too bad you didn't just get laid." I know!

Anyway, seriously, please go read and let us know what you think. Comment! Link! Tweet! Tongue kiss us (I mean, come on! More than two weeks here, folks!)! We've got some awesome new talent on board in the form of Mr. Lady from Whiskey in My Sippy Cup and Jessica from Bernthis. There's 26 letters in the alphabet, so I'll be back there when we get a little deeper into it. Someone has to bring the cheese to the party (or the pinatas if it's a party made of awesome) so that's a clue to let you know my next go 'round will be with the letter P.

Here's hoping the next time my Tool Man's home, I also get to go 'round with something that starts with the letter P.

everybody's got to grow up sometime. apparently.

When last we met, I was all cried out (I'll pause a moment to give you time to engage in the requisite singing of that song, safe in the knowledge that I, too, got my Lisa Lisa on)(here's some help if you need it), had tucked my collection of old love letters back into a large storage container in my basement, and was faced with a few decisions. Did I want to:

• put on my Velma glasses and, through a series of treacherous internet searches, find out what my former paramour is up to these days
• give up the ghost and watch season 2 of Dexter
• say "Hmmmm?" and/or "Wha?" in regard to another old letter I found while going through the treasure chest of my past

If you answered "All of the above," you're right! With a few keystrokes, I learned my former love has never tried to scare pesky (his word, not mine!) folk away from old ghost towns, but he has amassed an assortment of mundane traffic tickets over the years. Also, season 2 of Dexter, although bogged down a bit by the annoying British girl, was quite good, if not a smidgen predictable.

And what of the mysterious letter, you ask. What about the letter?! It was from a large state university that didn't award me my original journalism degree, and based on the jaunty way in which the registrar employee prefaced the letter, I wrote them first to inquire about graduate degree programs. In family and consumer science.

Apparently, I thought I wanted to be a dietitian.

(sidebar - at various times, I've also thought I wanted to be a zombie hunter, but they apparently hire them in-house because I never see help wanted ads for that position, or a king crab fisherman on the vast Bering Sea, but as I write this, I'm sitting in front of an open window and a brisk 65-degree breeze is wafting in, making me want to wrap up in the loving arms of my slanket, so those long hours toiling in arctic temperatures perhaps aren't ideal for my soft, cubicle-conditioned exterior)

I don't remember inquiring about graduate school, but based on the postmark on the outside of the envelope, I can understand why I thought it might be a good idea to spin my world a little more off it's axis at the time. I was sinking in the aftermath of the previously mentioned break up, and my father was in a hospital attempting to recover from a stroke we'd soon learn he'd never fully be able to. Why not toss another dash of chaos and potential remorse into the pot and see how it tasted, hmm? Since I thought I wanted to be a dietitian, I must have thought it would taste fantastic.

That moment - at 25 - was perhaps the first time I gave serious thought to what I wanted to be when I grew up. I spent the majority of my college years clueless to life afterward. There were two years in the education program thinking I'd be a teacher. God bless those who do teach, because the fact it took me two years to learn I didn't want to be a teacher was a strong indicator of how effective I'd have been getting a lesson across in a classroom. By junior year, I thought graphic arts sounded fun, but in the olden days, you had to know how to actually draw, so my first attempt was a sloppy straight line - with a ruler - through that option on my list.

Don't we all grow up with ideas of what we want to be when we grow up? Whether it's something attainable or a grand dream, don't we all imagine such things? Or is that something I've picked up from television programs? Because I honestly can't remember ever having a thought, big or small, about what I wanted to be when I reached adulthood.

(zombie hunter not withstanding, of course)

When I received this particular letter, I'd been working as a newspaper reporter for two years. A degree in journalism seemed like the last feasible option on my list when I decided to pursue it, and when I was offered the reporting job after graduation, I told anyone who'd listen I'd only be there a year because I absolutely didn't ever want to work at a newspaper, thank you very much. Hear me now, I'd say, I (who) don't want to be a news reporter (what) when I grow up (when)!

A year later, I was named editor of said newspaper.

I held that position for five years. Add that to the two years I spent as a reporter, subtract the part where I kept saying I didn't want to be a news reporter, and, well, you can see I was a news reporter for seven years. If you needed help figuring that out, remember to be sure to thank a math teacher, not me! Apparently, I'd decided reporting WAS what I was going to do when I grew up, but it wasn't want I WANTED to do.

While working as a reporter, I once spent a day in a preschool classroom for a feature story. As I scribbled notes and snapped photos, I overheard a boy tell a friend he intended to be a turtle when he grew up. Not a fireman nor policeman nor doctor. He only wanted to be a turtle. As he mapped out his plans, I felt envious of this five year old and his resolute goal, impossible as it was. By now, that boy has likely gone on to decidedly non-reptilian ventures (of which I hope he wasn't too disappointed), and I have tried out a few others, too, but I still have no idea what I want to be when I grow up. Finding this letter reminded me of that. From time to time, I've chalked this disconnected feeling up to the fact that, in all honesty, I don't feel like I'm a grown up. I mean, come on, I have an imaginary 14 year old boy living inside me, for god sake (hey Seth)! However, I'm 41, and I do grown up things and have grown up responsibilities, and I quite imagine it's about time I have a grown up plan. At the very least, it would be nice to have a plan that doesn't end in me floundering around clueless and/or afraid.

I love my primary job of being a stay-at-home mom, and I'm going to pretend I didn't call it a job even though many days it absolutely feels like work. I also, for the most part, love my part time bookseller job. However, my boys are fast approaching a time when they don't always need me around and I can't always work for minimum wage. It feels like I have to consider how to fill in the blanks created by not being part of the full time work force and how I can use that information to decide what I want to do for the rest of my life. Tonight we had take out food and ice cream for supper, so that dietitian's job may not be the first option that comes up. Tomorrow I'll return to my day shift at the bookstore while the boys are in school.

And if you know any turtles, would you maybe consider putting in a good word for me?

file under A for 'awesome, these things are not'

See that? That can't be good, right? I don't know why I'm asking you. I mean, I showed this photo to my Tool Man Monday night when he got home from work and I asked him, "This can't be good, right?" and he made this little tsk sound with his tongue, and then he said, "Oh, that can't be good," so I think we've ascertained that this cannot, in fact, be good. We've all heard of the blue screen of death. Hell, I've sent people condolence cards when they've mentioned their computers came down with it, so I figured I was totally living on borrowed time when this, in all it's various shades of blue and green stripes, popped up on my laptop screen Monday morning.

My first thought, of course, was (say it with me!) "This can't be good." Then I thought, "Crap! Now how am I going to discreetly watch episodes of True Blood in a manner that may or may not be responsible for this screen now adorning my laptop?"

(sidebar: Is it just me or did they switch the actress who plays Tara after the first episode, because I swear they did and it's bugging the hell out of me, and I asked Tool Man what he thought, but Tool Man? He doesn't put that much thought into a TV program unless there are Cyclons involved, and then it's like we reverse roles and I just can't be made to frackin' care)

(also, where might one such as myself acquire a gentlemanly Southern vampire to call on me?)

This malfunction occurred while I was noshing on some delicious peanut butter toast before work and watching a Kids In The Hall clip over at Backpacking Dad's blog. Right in the middle of the funny - Poof! I was all, "Well, that's a fine how do you do! First I do not get a free hot blogger calendar featuring some blogger whom I have made no secret I find to be awesome, but now this?!"

Then I took another bite of toast (while it was still warm and melty, something I bet hot bloggers, awesome or not, do not eat in order to maintain The Hotness), took out my camera (first thought - "This is lots and lots of pointless blog fodder!" followed by "I should probably show this to Tool Man."). Then I thought about calling Dell, from whom I purchased my laptop last year, but I bought it through their business arm to get a fantastic deal, and my made-up business' name is Happy Time Fun Ranch, and seriously, every time I say that or I get mail from Dell addressed to me in care of Happy Time Fun Ranch, I have to sit on the curb by the mailbox and giggle for a bit.

Because I lead a truly sad and boring life...

Long story short, tonight I'm writing this scintillating nugget of my life on the above pictured, apparently not doomed laptop, and after a bit of deduction on my part and those of my employees at Happy Time Fun Ranch, I believe the culprit of the 70s-era wallpaper death screen was the half glass of Diet Pepsi I spilled on the counter that seeped under my laptop Saturday while watching Gremlins on AMC.

An event also involving Backpacking Dad!!

Coincidence? I cannot say with any certainty. All I know is if my laptop now multiplies (kudos, sir...), we'll get a hell of a lot more work done around here at Happy Time Fun Ranch, and also, I should probably not watch Gremlins 2 - The New Batch when it airs this weekend.

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Had enough of me yet? No? OK, well let me regale you with this one:

See that? That can't be good, right? I don't know why I am asking you, because I can assure you that is, indeed, not good! I pulled that GIGANTIC HAIR out of my mouth, dislodging the remainder of it from my NOT DELICIOUS McDonald's cheeseburger tonight at supper. Let me just say two things before saying a whole bunch more: (a) my hair is amazing (ahem...), and (b) it doesn't look a thing like the follicle that garnished my half-eaten sandwich!!

I can't get hot french fries, but I can, apparently, get a fur burger.

(Oh, I'm sorry that I used that phrase. Honestly. But I am totally keeping it in there because I said it to my Tool Man after I tossed the rest of my meal out and he continued to eat the remainder of his apparently hairless cheeseburger in front of me!! Even while I was all, "I'm so hungry! I'll never eat at McDonald's again. Except I do like that Southwest grilled chicken salad, so dammit...")

Ali? Any chance you could take this up with the fine folks at McDonald's and see what they have to say for themselves? I'd consider retribution in the form of unlimited McFlurries.

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OK, I must say, I've reached the point where I'm boring myself, and that can't be good, right? So I'll apologize. I should be in bed anyway, because tomorrow, I have to be out of the house by 9 a.m., to go work a four hour volunteer shift at the Scholastic Books warehouse sale that I committed to doing when my friend suggested we do it together, except, ha ha, tonight my friend bailed on me!

Also, did you catch that?

I'm going to go work at a book sale.

On my only day off from my regular job.

My regular job as a bookseller at a Major Bookseller.

Where I normally only work three hours a shift.

Yeah. I'm volunteering even more time on my day off to do for free what I normally get paid to do for less

Because I'm good, alright?

stop me if you've heard this one*

*except you might want to rethink putting the kibosh on this post just yet because your other option was reading a tale that involves farts and/or the act of farting, which, I should warn you, is coming**

Last night, my Tool Man and I were enjoying a little quiet time doing what we do best, which is watching television. I was pretty excited to see that HBO (which we're getting free for three months since we switched to satellite, so yeah! Except they're apparently running all the same movies they used to when I was 16 and my parents had pay cable, so I'm looking forward to watching Footloose in a couple weeks then going to the mall with my BFF) was running the first season of True Blood last night, and a lot of you have told me there are some kick ass vampires on that show, so I was was all, "Hey! Record that!" except Tool Man ignored me and started watching a TV program that is being cancelled and he made me miss the first episode of True Blood, which I now may or may not have to watch nefariously.

(hold on...let me reread that first paragraph to see if I'm as confused as this sounds in my head. OK, no. I'm good)

Anyway, after Tool Man got done watching his doomed television program, he was flipping channels and, glory be to the Lord Almighty, he came across Legend (already in progress), and this time, when I yelled stop, Tool Man dropped the remote so we could watch Tom Cruise and his elven friends battle Darkness' evil plan to snuff out daylight by killing unicorns. It doesn't make sense, but honestly, I haven't really ever watched this movie once (of many, many times) in the last 23 years since it was released and completely followed it. I just like unicorns, sprites and princesses, of which this film has plenty.

I won't spoil the ending (let's just say it's hokey), but the final scene involves two glorious unicorns frolicking in the sun as flower petals and wispy leaves swirl around them (whoops...) and Tom Cruise and Princess Sloane from Ferris Bueller's Day Off are kissing and waving at their sprightly allies, and the whole time I'm waiting for that great Bryan Ferry song to kick in. Oh, you know what. Here, I'll just show you:





(Spoiler alert!) As the sun glimmered upon the horns of the majestic unicorns, I leaned over to my Tool Man, slapped him on the thigh, and said, "Look! It's a metaphor for Tom Cruise's and Princess Sloane's love! I learned that in film study in college, even though I fell asleep during Citizen Kane and had to watch it again to understand. It proves they were meant to be!"

Tool Man leaned over, slugged me on the arm, and said, "No. It just means unicorns are always horny."

And I sat there for about two seconds before I "got it," and then I laughed (just a little bit)(and I may have Twittered it, but remember what I asked you guys. This is fresh material!), and then I got a bit worried.

"Hold up. When you say unicorns are always horny, is that a metaphor for us having sex now?" I said, but Tool Man has a cold and the meds he's taking make him feel a little bit like the Devil (check out those abs!) and sound like Honeythorn Gump from Legend (um, listen to the above clip), so he assured me that no, he was not looking for sex, so I was kind of relieved. Then he went to bed and I scanned the movie listings for different metaphors and the first episode of True Blood.

The End.

**because I keep telling you that I'm really a 14-year-old boy, and really, if a post about farts doesn't prove it, I'm not sure what else I have to do.***

***except maybe talk about boobs more often, which, I'm sorry, I've been lax about, and I'll see what I can do about rectifying that.

things I learned this week...

• The world is populated by one or two truly fickle people.
• Rather than making me organized, five years at home with my children has wiped out all ability I have to accomplish 12 things at once.
• Fifth grade math is already harder than a full year of fourth grade math.
• I feel no shame in admitting how pathetic I am at math.
• My age drops by 15 years the instant I'm reunited with college friends. You can almost see it happening.
• Finding a way to laugh as hard as I did with my college friends this past weekend is a goal I need to achieve regularly.
• Telling people to "bugger off" or asking to get a gander at the husband's "meat and two veg" would sound so much more cool with an English accent.
• I'm obsessed with having an English accent this week. I can pull off a reasonably tame drawl, but only if I say words like "river" and "bar".
• I can be quite seductive, but I can't figure out a way to transform "river" or "bar" into a phrase that make a bloke want to faff me.
• Contrary to popular belief, I don't need a variety of blokes to faff me to be happy. I'm no slag.
• People who think with their dicks have a tendency to actually be dicks.
• I'm horrifically impatient these days. The package I'm waiting for from Amazon is both the reason and the remedy for this matter.
• I'm surrounded by books every day and yet can't catch a break to read one of my own.
• It feels like a weight has been lifted off me this week. This is inexplicably good.
• The universe brings you friends you didn't even realize you needed and now know you couldn't do without.
• I want an English accent so badly I even typed this entry thinking in an English accent.

Now it's your turn to witter. Tell me a few things you learned this week in the comments below, then together we can pool this brain trust together and take over the world. Or at least a small section of the Midwest. We should start small, after all. Not appear too greedy.