Tag: random

Sir, We GET IT

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We live near a large park and in general have very active neighbors. I tend to see the same people out often in about a 1 mile radius around our house and especially jogging on the canal. I’ve noticed lately that I have seen the same guy running all over the place; near the mall, near the grocery, at the park, etc.

The reason I notice him is not for the reasons I think he would want to be noticed for. First, he always wears a beanie. It can be 60 degrees or 100+ and the guy always has on a beanie. Second, he’s never wearing a shirt. Third, he wears cargo shorts. And lastly but certainly not leastly, he has two LARGE Doberman Pincers on a joined leash tied around his waist.

The first time I saw this dude running by my car, my thought was “We get it! You workout! A lot! And you have tough dogs! You want everyone looking at you to think you’re tough too! But the dogs tied to your waist might be a touch overboard!”.

Every time I see him, I can’t help but think about what kind of person he is – because you can’t workout like that and not be a total and complete weirdo. I imagine him to be that guy in the office who is short and bald so he makes up for it by talking loudly and also condescendingly to his coworkers. He drives a BMW, but only makes $30k a year. He wears Ed Hardy shirts (when he does wear a shirt) and  he doesn’t have a conversation without texting on his blackberry.

In short, I hate this guy. It takes great strength to stop my car in front of him, roll down the window and scream “REALLY?!?!”. And on the outside chance someone reading The Goon Room knows Mr.Shirtless Waist Leash guy, do him a favor and give him the link to the blog. And a shirt. And a memo that says “enough already, we GET IT”.

Coupons Shmoopons

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I keep seeing the commercials for this show called Extreme Couponing on TLC. Here’s the link: http://press.discovery.com/us/tlc/programs/extreme-couponing/

Basically, these women go to crazy lengths to get multiple coupons which then lead to their entire grocery bill totalling $0. Meaning they have so many coupons, they don’t have to pay anything.

I do grab a few coupons here and there when I get them in the mail or from family members who don’t use them. My sister and I trade the leftovers from each Sunday’s paper and I end up with a little stack each week for the grocery. I refuse to buy anything that I don’t need or a brand I don’t like. If it’s not Jiffy Peanut Butter, I’m not interested.  Lately, I’ve had a few duplicates and I was very excited to live my own Extreme Couponing dream knowing that a few items on my list would be totally free. The money saving is just a bonus. Really, it’s turned into a challenge so saving money means duh, WINNING.

And here’s where I call bullshit on the Extreme Coupon movement. I have been to Safeway, Target, Fry’s and even (gasp) WalMart. And let me tell you, NONE OF THEM will take more than one coupon per item. Meaning if I buy one box of Truvia sweetener and I have three coupons, I can only use one coupon per box.

So how are these people doing it?! If WALMART won’t help me out, who will? Do these women stalk the cashier that they know either doesn’t know or  doesn’t care about the number of items to the number of coupons ratio?? That said, how are they buying 20 boxes of pasta for free? Are there coupons out there for the total cost of an item?? And who needs 20 boxes of pasta??

I guess my experiment goes down in the “failed” column. And I can stop trying to hoard extra coupons from family and friends and take a few dollars saved as a win. And leave the food hording, paper cut fingers, dumpster diving for tossed newspapers and cashier convincing to the “professionals”. You win ladies, you win.

House Happenings

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There’s always something amusing going on at our house. I’ve never really figured out if it’s actually funny, or if we’re so deprived of quality time outside of each other that we just think we’re funny.

Peter and I love to hike. It’s a little more tedious now with the muchkin since one of us has to carry her in the backpack – which totals around 40 pounds, thus making uphill hiking a bit challenging. But Peter has found a great trail with little elevation change which makes for an enjoyable and manageable workout. A few weeks ago we had returned from our outing and I asked Peter (he would say I yelled this at him, but really, he exaggerates) to take off his boots before coming in the house. I am both the energy and cleanliness nazi. When he wants to vacuum and mop (quick Peter! Where do we keep the mop??), he can track in as much dirt as he wants.

About 10 minutes later, I was in the kitchen and noted Peter walking with his boots on, in the back door, across the living room and out the front door. After stepping outside, he proceeded to take off his boots. The following the conversation that ensued:

“Did you just walk across the house with your boots on in order to take them off outside a different door?”

Silence.

“What’s the right answer here?”

Aaaannnd that’s why he’s a good lawyer.

Sock Gnomes

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Apparently the way to beat a sock gnome is with patience. Much like a two-year old who won’t got to sleep, it turns out the little buggers will give in if you wait them out long enough.

What is a sock gnome? An SG is an invisible, tiny creature that steals socks. Not pairs of sock, but one sock at a time.

After folding copious amounts of laundry, I’m usually left with one or two socks without mates. I leave them in the bottom of the laundry basket as their buddy, who was probably stuck under the hamper, didn’t make into the hamper, was captive in Baylie’s bag or has been stuck in the arm of a shirt, will usually show up in the next load.

It dawned on me a few weeks ago that the number of single socks in the basket were multiplying. To the tune of 8 socks with no mates. I decided I would wait a week and if their twin didn’t show up, they were gonners. When the time came to make good on my proclamation, I couldn’t do it. So there the lonely socks sat…until this week.

As I was pulling yet another load of whites out of the dryer, I noted a sock that I was certain came from the sad sock collection. And then another one fell out – same thing. Sure that I had accidentally washed the mate-less bunch, I dug to the bottom of the basket. Much to my surprise, I found all the singles were still there. THEIR MATES HAD MAGICALLY RETURNED! As I matched the friends up, I noted that the prodigal socks were a little worse for the wear. They were all a little faded and a little stretched. Perhaps the sock gnomes only have one foot and therefore only need one sock? And the like to sit in the sun wearing their sock?

So the moral of the story is this; sock gnomes are annoying, albeit impatient little creeps. Wait them out and your feet will once again be covered in matching footwear.

What’s in Baylie’s Bag? – 3rd Eddition

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This week Bay’s bag of choice  was my big beach tote. She could easily fit inside it if she wanted and it takes her two little baby man hands plus a lot of strength to carry it around, but she loves it.

Contents:

A hat

Her sandals

A bottle of lotion

Butt Paste diaper rash cream

A ziploc bag

Her Mini Mouse purse – she needs a bag to carry all her bags!

Play food ice cream and cookies

Rasins

A bowl of Goldfish crackers

Her Barbie cup

The box from a new bottle of Benadryl

Her “goggles” – she think because her sun glasses have a strap that they are goggles

Her business card that daddy made. It reads:

Baylor E. Wand

BaP (Big Girl at Play)

Available for Bar Mitzvahs, Weddings, Parties and Funerals

 

 

Search Me

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In anticipation of the one year anniversary of The Goon Room, I was looking over some of the blog’s stats. Top posts, highest number of visitors, etc. One stat that I find hilarious is tags searched. So what people are using to search for The Goon Room. And they are:

goon room, the goon room blog, the goon room, terrorist drink

Now, the first three make sense. But if you haven’t been a reader of The Goon Room for long, they you’re probably unfamiliar with the last one. Be sure and catch up on “If We Don’t Drink, the Terrorist Win“.

Are They Twins?

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Something baffling and hilarious happened the other night. It was a rare night where Peter was home from work earlier than 10 minutes before B goes to bed. So we were sitting on our front patio, enjoying the lovely 72 degrees and a glass of wine.

A neighbor who I recognize, but haven’t met (and probably won’t based on what happened next) walked by as she normally does in the evenings. Bay was being Bay and running around climbing into the chair, back out and then up onto the bench Peter and I were sitting on and then back. As our neighbor walked by we said hello, she responded and then smiled nicely and said “Are they twins?”

Perplexed, but trying not to be jerks, Peter and I smiled as we were clearly stumped. Were who twins? Us? The bench and the chair? Our dogs? About 5 seconds later, we realized she couldn’t quite see over the small wall that surrounds the patio and had thought our freakishly fast-moving 20 month old was 2 kids instead of one. So we explained that no, she’s just fast. The neighbor laughed and headed on her way.

I’d like to think she kept moving out of embarrassment and not out of pity for having a Tasmanian devil for a daughter.

What The Mary Poppins?

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Because B has been sick all week, we’ve been doing a lot of nothing. Our day consists of  administering Tylenol, Vicks Vapor Rub and sitting in the bathroom with the shower on and breathing in the steam. Pretty much anything that will help her breathe easier and recover from this nasty virus.

We started watching Mary Poppins two days ago – one of my all time favorite movies as a kid. As we continued watching it last night, I realized one thing – this is a strange movie. Like Alice in Wonderland / alternate meaning to scenes weird.

First, why is the neighbor’s house shaped like a ship and why does he fire off cannons? I’m not so weirded out by Mary and the children’s trip into the sidewalk chalk paintings, I am however disturbed that Mary then denies that they did this later. And what the hell is the scene with Uncle Albert all about?! Why are they all on the ceiling laughing and having a tea party?? I also think it would be Uncle Albert’s picture  next to “child molester” in the dictionary. I was going to add a picture to the post, but it freaked me out to look at it long enough to save it and add it in…

Thinking back, my other favorite movie as a kid was Old Yeller. For anyone who hasn’t seen this movie – the lovable dog and title character is shot by his master at the end of the movie because he has rabies. When I realized as an adult what actually happened to Old Yeller, I was a little concerned what this said about me and my personality. The more I thought about it, I didn’t realize the owner was killing OY. So really, I should be less concerned about deep psychological issues and more concerned with the fact that I was apparently a very dense child (yes Peter, I said CHILD. Not adult and no, there is no need for a correction).

So today, I’m feeling a little like Phoebe (from Friends, not the dog that we found last weekend) when she realized that her mother had edited all the movies she saw as a kid and never knew the full meaning behind them. I’m now a little afraid too of watching anymore childhood favorites for fear I will learn that they too have some coo coo meaning and or further prove that I was in fact, a very dumb kid.

Things I am Ungrateful For

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1. No toddler cough syrup. It amazes me that the medical world can transplant organs, cure horrible diseases, etc. And yet they can’t come up with a cough medicine for a sick 20 month old. I say we lock some scientist up with a few sick toddlers for a few days and see what they come up with. My guess would be some kick ass cough syrup.

2. Benadryl. It doesn’t  help Baylie sleep because she hates the taste and spits most of it out.

3. Rude people. People that are in line at CVS at 1pm on a Wednesday buying beer and don’t let the mom with a sick and sleeping kiddo slung over her shoulder with her enormous purse on the other arm, pedialyte pops and tylenol in her hand go in front of them. I know that was an awkward and run on sentence and no, I don’t care.

4. Mother Nature. I get that it’s winter and all, but the extreme wind that keeps blowing the blankets, towels, frost cloth, sheets, etc. off of my plants thus negating all my hard work to keep them from freezing, is a bit overkill, no? It’s fun to make it feel like winter now and then, but could we cap that low temperature around 40 degrees?

5. Stupid people. Why would someone call and leave you a voice mail stating the purpose of their call and a request for a call back without telling you their name? Idiots, that’s who.

 

No Good Deed Goes Unpunished

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This past Sunday morning we hosted a small brunch for a group of friends. While prepping the delicious dishes we would be enjoying, I noticed two dogs sniffing around in our front yard.

And thankfully this time, they weren’t our dogs out there unbeknownst to us.

At first, I thought they were our drunk neighbor’s dogs who he lets roam the hood to poop in other people’s yards. If the neighbors complain, he comes over and picks up his dog’s “deposit” and claims he didn’t know they were out. Which we all know is a lie, but because we don’t want the drunk a-hole in our yard and he desperately wants to get back to his V-Dub bus with his cooler (not kidding, he sits in the back of it and drinks –  we don’t live in a hood, but I see where it sound like we do…) we all pretend that it’s true. Upon closer inspection, these dogs were wearing collars, something our drunk neighbor doesn’t find to be important. So I walked out front with a treat to see if either one of the dogs would come to me.

The Chow mix instantly took off, but the Black Lab came right to me. Her tag said her name was Phoebe and she instantly assumed the “gopher” position – sitting down but with her paws in the air – and absolutely adorable. So I called the number on her tag and left a  message for the owner that she was with us and her friend was most likely close by. You see, Bear T. Dog got out of our yard several years ago and was found on a semi busy road by a very sweet woman who coaxed him into her car right after witnessing him almost being run over. So in an effort to repay the cosmos for the favor of returning the sweet and “uses-his-brain-for-evil-rather-than-good” Bear, I tied Phoebe to our bench out front and gave her some water. I was assuming that her owners would be calling any minute frantic that their dog(s) were gone.

An hour passed. Another hour passed and still nothing. We had friends over for brunch and still no call. All the while Phoebe sat on our bench, laid in the shade, barked at passers-by and lapped up her water.

Until her collar broke.

Peter went in from the back patio where we were having brunch to check on the napping kiddo and found that her very old plastic collar snap had broken and Phoebe was nowhere to be found. I called the number from her tag again and still, no answer.

So now in an effort to do a good deed, I’ve not only not found this dog’s owner, but I’ve let her run back out into the wild with no collar. Awesome.

The strangest part is that the owner has still never returned my voicemail. In an effort to keep myself from imagining horrible scenarios and crying myself to sleep while clutching Bear under one arm and Travis under the other, I’ve decided that both dogs have found their way home and the owner chalked the voicemail up to a drunk dial.

Bear says: “What is this ‘uses-his-brain-for-evil-rather-than-good’ business?!? Oh, and do you think you could bother to get me a haircut?? I’m starting to get dreds in my beard. And stop feeding random dogs my treats, damn it.”