my morning shock...

when i was a teenager, my sister and i used to torment my mom's husband.  we would let our cat, elliott, lick the butter before our stepdad would use it to on his toast.  we would sit at the kitchen table just waiting, then snicker when he would sit down to eat it.  we also had another trick that we played on him quite often...

every morning he would come downstairs dressed for work: slacks, button up shirt, dress shoes and a tie.  every morning, for an extended period of time, we would put a rubber band on the spray nozzle and turn it so it was aimed directly at anyone who stood in front of the sink.  every morning, we sat at the kitchen table eating our breakfast ready for the show that we knew would happen.  he would go to the sink, lift the handle to turn on the water, and get sprayed smack dab in his chest with the water from the nozzle.  my sister and i would break out in hysterical laughter.  he would have some choice words to say to us before going upstairs to change his clothes.

ah, the good old days.

you know how they, whoever they are, say karma will get you?  well i really dislike when they are right, but karma came and bit me in the rear this morning.  it's six in the morning, i've already been up crying while chopping onions, mincing garlic, and browning beef for the beef and barley soup that's simmering in my crock pot.  i've had a half of cup of coffee and my alarm is going off because it is time for me to get in the shower.

i trudge upstairs to the only bathroom in my house with a shower.  set my robe on the counter.  pull the shower curtain open a bit.  turn on the water to hot, because i like a really hot shower.  then pull the tab up, so the water comes out of the shower head instead of pouring out of the spout.  these are the same steps i go through every morning, but this morning there was a surprise waiting for me.  i should give you a little more info on my shower.

i have one of those shower heads that comes out of a holder so you can hold it in your hand and spray the tub out, or pretend you are at the hair salon and rinse your hair like the stylist does, or wash your pets, or any other activity that would require you to have a movable shower head.  i rarely touch the shower head.  i have no real reason to remove it from the holder, unless i am scouring the tub and need to rinse it down. sometimes though the shower head gets moved.  this morning was one of those times.  i pulled the tab to have the water come out of the shower head and got blasted in the face.

this is a shocking way to start your shower, mostly because i wasn't functioning in fully caffeinated mode, i was only half caff at this point.  so i fumbled with the shower curtain to close it back up and stop blasting myself in the face.  then snaked my arm around the closed shower curtain to turn the shower head back to where it should be.  the rest of my shower went great.

at breakfast, i posed the question do either of you know how the shower head gets turned facing out? ash quickly and emphatically denied knowing anything about it. miss p was slower in her response, but said yep, i like to pretend i'm at the hair dressers when i rinse my hair.  i tell them the story about my shower experience, which obviously put them both in stitches and left them with the following warning.

if this happens again

i will come into your room

while you are sleeping

and douse you in water

then leave

i always tell my kids we aren't a "tit for tat" kind of family, but in this instance, i'm comfortable with the tat. 

almost race day...

so i'm two weeks out from my first half marathon.  i have to admit that i am far from ready for this darn race.  when i signed up i was super excited, very motivated, and running.  you kind of need all three things to be successful at this organized race thing.  so let me tell you what's been going on.

weather: i was running into a problem with the heat.  i'm not a good heat person. even just sitting in the sun to enjoy a dining experience is tough for me when it is hot. in fact just the other night i was out to dinner with a friend and i was sweating balls.  i looked like i had gone swimming, my dress was dripping, i had sweat running from my neck to my feet, and i wasn't exerting any energy at all. so, i can't run in the heat, i probably would pass out from heat exhaustion.  to combat the heat, i switched to running in the mornings.  running in the mornings sucks.  doing an activity before i have my coffee is one of the dumbest things i've ever heard of, but i was doing it.  this brings me to the next issue...

time:  so i'm a pansy and can't hack the heat leaving me with the option of running in the cool morning.  daylight hours started to impact the mornings.  i was having to wait for it to be light enough outside which left me with not enough time to complete the distance needed before i had to get ready for work.  naturally if it is taking longer in the morning to brighten up, it is getting darker in the evening sooner, which rules out evening running.  i'm not the girl who is comfortable to run, by myself, when it is getting dark. my self defense ninja type skills aren't quite up to par.

injury:  somehow i injured my neck during a fitful night's sleep.  i sleep alone, sometimes with a cat, but generally alone, so i'm not sure what i was doing, but i woke up unable to turn my neck from side to side or look up or down.  that took place 2 1/2 weeks ago and i'm still stiff in the neck.  there was no way i could possibly run during that time.  it took everything i had to make it through the day without overdoing it.

all of these factors, weather, time and injury have left me without enough time to be prepared how i would like to be for race day.  bummer.

i'm still going.  i figure the race is 13.1 miles, i will run a mile, take a break at the mile marker, catch my breath, then run the next mile.  i will do this 13 times until i cross that finish line.  this is not how i envisioned running my first half, but it's going to have to do.

on a side note, i'm going to need a treadmill.  anyone willing to part with their dusty clothes rack?

be amazing...

in the time of selfie's 

something pretty awesome happens 

when you ask a random stranger to take your picture  

here we are with our best smiles

hips popped

legs cocked

 you name it we are posing at our best

but our random stranger wasn't satisfied with a boring posed shot

she tells us be amazing!

we don't really know what in the world she is talking about, but here you go

not quite done, but we are on our way

for three long time friends from small town lake stevens

this is what amazing looks like to us. 

mishaps of river floating...

my annual girls weekend brings me to leavenworth in a big beautiful house right on the river. don't ask me what part of leavenworth, because i've never paid that much attention, i'm just happy to be there.  it's a weekend full of laughter, copious amounts of food, some adult beverages, sunbathing, and a little mischief.  this weekend i had one goal: even out my tan.

about a month before the trip, i was out on my friend's boat for the evening.  we were just shooting the breeze when he said, "heather, you have a tan line that runs right down the side of your body."  huh?  what is he talking about, so i look.  sure enough, since i generally sit out in the sun with my backside to a lawn chair, only the front of me is tan.  instantly that friends episode where ross goes to the spray tan place pops in my head, "i'm an 8!!" at this point i have a fairly nice tan on my front side but the back is the same pasty white winter shade.  i tell him that i hate laying out in the sun on my stomach because i feel like i am suffocating. not sure if anyone else feels this way, but it seriously keeps me from tanning my backside.

i figure while i have two full days of sun soaking to do, i can plop onto on inner tube and hopefully even things up a bit.  so there i am, floating the river, tethered to shore so i don't get lost, and soaking up the rays. it was pretty peaceful and i didn't feel like i was suffocating.

if you look closely you can see the shore on the other side of the river.  it wasn't a really wide river, but wide enough that you should be able to float without chance of injury.  yes, there is a story coming.

day two of floating in the river, evening out my tan, and we have visitors.  a small group of fishermen casting their lines into the river.  the swirls of water behind me are apparently a good place to cast your hook.  so i'm floating with my back end towards the other shore, my friend ana is floating next to me and we are cackling about something, when all of a sudden my left arm is hit.

it felt like a rock had hit my arm.  i yelped, "ouch" and started looking around.  about the same time ana noticed that she had a fishing hook lying across her chest.  it was then i realized what hit my arm was the weight on the line to sail the hook through the air.

i look behind me at the yahoo that is trying to "catch" us and he is reeling like mad. ana starts yelling at him to "wait, wait!"  i don't know if he realized he has hooked ana, but it takes several attempts to get him to stop reeling in his line.  ana successfully unhooks herself and tosses his line far away from us.  she survived without injury, i on the other hand suffered a lump and bruise from the weight.

you would think that we would hear a "sorry about that" from the other side of the shore, but no. those darn fishermen said nothing.  in fact they just kept casting right where we were floating.  our fishermen friends were there most of the day. unfortunately for them, they never caught a thing.  all that work for nothing.

just for your viewing pleasure, here is that clip of ross and the spray tan.  i love this episode!

one is the loneliest number...

i purposely keep myself uber busy.  my days start at the crack of dawn and end when the sun goes down.  either i am at work, running kids all over the county, filling my head with school stuff, or on an adventure with family and friends.  i don't usually give myself too much of a break.  so last night, as i sat in my living room sort of watching a movie that i had really wanted to see, sipping on a beer that i usually really like but didn't like last night, i realized how lonely i was.  my eyes kept wandering to the vacant side of my couch and my mind kept wondering who was ever going to fill that vacant side.

there are aspects about sharing your life with someone that i truly miss.

1. conversation:  you know the back and forth of sharing your day.  even if you don't want to hear the specifics of their day, there is someone, an adult, that can't wait to talk to you. usually that person asks about yours and you froth at the mouth because you can't wait to tell them about something.  when you live without another adult there isn't another person to actually talk to.  sure i can text the message to someone, "hey suzie you will never guess what happened today?!" but it just isn't the same as watching someone engage in your day.  seeing them either light up and become completely engrossed or even when they tune you out and you punch them in the arm spouting off, "dude are you listening?!".

2.  snuggling:  after my kids go to bed, either i watch a show that i get from netflix (still on disc in the mail) or i read on my couch or in bed.  physical contact with another person is something i crave.  i'm not even talking sexual contact, just physical contact.  sitting close enough to each other that you feel their warmth.  maybe you touch feet every now and then.  maybe you wriggle your way under the crook of their arm and nestle in beside them.  whatever kind of contact, it is important to me and i miss having that contact on a regular basis.

3.  going on adventures:  i like to do things.  i am busy, i drag my kids all over tarnation experiencing life.  if my kids aren't around, i tend to go on adventures alone, but darn it, it would be so much more fun if i had to someone in my life to share that with.  for me adventures don't have to be big, planned out ordeals.  anything outside of the normal day to day routine is an adventure in my book.  for example the other night i was with a friend and we were trying to open a beer bottle with a quarter and a magnet (something i had seen on my facebook newsfeed).  it sounded so far fetched we had to try.  it didn't work, but for those ten minutes we were engaged in the activity we laughed, problem solved, and ribbed each other for thinking it would actually work. it was awesome, we were experiencing life together.

now i recognize that sharing your life with someone brings just as many hiccups as good things, but isn't that the whole point?  having those uncomfortable moments allows us to grow as individuals as well as a couple, which means that the good things about sharing your life with someone are just that much better.

anyway, i still don't know who is going to fill the vacant side of my couch (and bed) and honestly i'm not that worried about it.  when it's right it will happen and i will adjust my life to include someone else.  until then i will stay super busy experiencing life and being me.

being groomed...

funny thing about asking for inspiration, you go with a topic and then it brings up other ones.  so the same individual that suggested is the grass greener then asked, "is an emotional affair real?" 

have you ever had one of those moments where you want to reach through a screen and slap someone up side the head shouting, "yes, you fool!"  well, that was my reaction when the above question was asked.  thankfully i'm not a violent person, nor do i have super powers to reach through screens, because the question asker would've found himself with a wild cat to deal with.

i can only speak from my personal experience, but i know that my involvement with a man emotionally, eventually turned into something physical.  i can say with complete honesty, that this was never my intention.  i wasn't seeking affirmation, attention or passion from an outside source.  I can't pinpoint when the dynamics between us changed, but they did and i've had to live with that course of events ever since.

an emotional affair is a grooming process.  when my contact with this other person started, it was casual, platonic and never had the inkling of crossing a moral or physical line.  we were friends, i was married, he knew that, nothing was ever going to change, end of story.  except that wasn't the end of the story, the frequency of our contact increased, which led to a shift of context within the contact.  at some point, a dependency for the contact, a desire for more, and an intrigue of what was to come started to bloom within me.  before i knew it, the feelings associated with this other person held value even though i knew i shouldn't be feeling this way. 

all of this, all the feelings, the desire, and the intrigue developed without any sexual physical contact.  it wasn't until much later that the physical line was crossed.

i should stop here and say, i am not blaming this other person for putting me in this position.  i was, by all accounts, open to the friendship and an active participant in it's evolvement.  i trusted he had my best interest in mind and wasn't massaging the situation for his benefit.  years later, i still don't think the progression our friendship took was an intentional, calculated plan, even though some close to me beg to differ. anyhow, let's take a look at the grooming process.

Me: hey, how's it going?  i have a question, do you know where i can get (insert something)?
Him: hey, not bad. you?  yes, i do (answer to the question)
you exchange a couple of basics about general life, nothing specific.  a couple of days go by

Me:  hey.  thanks for the info, worked out great.
Him: hey.  no problem. catch you later.
this kind of stuff happens over several weeks maybe even months. then a little slip up happens a dirty joke, or the use of a pet name, or maybe even a "i was just thinking about you."  instead of shutting down this type of interaction or ignoring it, you play along and have now given the green light that you are okay with this type of interaction.  jump forward a week or two, a month or two, after playing along and now your interaction might go something like this.

Him:  morning sunshine.  what are you doing today? 
Me:  hi! i'm not sure yet.  do you want to get a cup of coffee?
now the pet name and the morning "wake-up" text is a frequent occurrence.  you start seeing this person on occasion but the face to face interaction is still within "friend" limits, even though your text conversations are crossing a line.  at this point there is still an opportunity to go back, but if this is the only source you are getting the warm fuzzies from it is really hard to ignore.

Him: morning sunshine.  any chance i can see you today?
Me: yes, I will figure out how to make that work.
at this point, you need the interaction and the physical proximity.  your exchanges have nothing to do with general information anymore it' s all about how you will see this person, complaining about the person you are committed to (to this other person), and maybe even planning out how you can make this a permanent thing. most likely you are hiding all forms of communication with this person.  even if you aren't sexually involved with this person (at this point) every other part of you is focused on this person. 

in my opinion, from personal experience, unless you shut down the borderline interaction from the get go, no matter how great your intentions are, it is really easy for things to progress without realizing how invested you are becoming.  like i said, i wasn't looking for affirmation, attention or passion from an outside source.  i didn't even realize that it was something that i was lacking until it started coming from an outside source. once it was being handed to me on a platter it was too tempting to turn away from.

i truly believe if you and your partner continue to "date" each other and actively work at keeping your relationship fresh and fun, there isn't a reason to be tempted by the forbidden apple.  this is just my theory. i am a divorced woman who hasn't had a serious relationship in three years, what do i really know?

anyway, the individual who asked the question and i, have had private conversations about this topic.  i am one hundred percent positive that an emotional affair is a real affair, whether or not it turns into a physical affair isn't the issue.  the point is you are engaging in intimate contact with a person outside of your committed relationship.  it is as simple as that for me.  however, the individual who posed the question is still on the fence saying, "i'm still not sure if the emotional affair is fabricated or factual". 

you now know my thoughts, what are yours?  is an emotional affair a "real" affair?

but first...

quick story because it just happened

and only this kind of stuff happens to me!

it is my lady time.  a couple of days early, but that is okay because this time i am prepared.  kind of.  i am using the facilities here at work to swap out my lady gear.  i am poised and ready to insert when the darn thing flips out of my hand and lands in the toilet bowl.

gasp!

i look between my legs into the bowl and the darn thing is swelling at rapid speed, sucking up all the water from the bowl.  i am kind of impressed at how much this thing holds, but that is way off track, i have an emergency.

what the heck am i supposed to do now?!

i only have the one and it is already in use.  it's 4:20 in the afternoon, almost time for me to head home.  well like any resourceful gal, i wad up some toilet paper, arrange it in my skivvies and ask to go home. 

but first, i had to share another mishap in flo's life. 

time to go home!